Café Verona at 8 AM
A tired espresso machine grinds
at the back counter. Niveous foam
runs down the edge of my thick-rimmed cup.
Over there, a chair scrapes against a wall,
a business suit leaves in a rustle
of New York Times. Laptops ignore each other.
Tomorrow will be the same tables of anonymity.
My body here so soft, so alive, so determined
to disappear. Raisiny, blueberry smells and caffeine
drawing me forward like a morning compass.
Published in Mangrove 2005