Poetry

Commonplace

by

Stacy Lynn Mar

It seems almost yesterday
Since I ordered my tea,
Extra sweet and add cinnamon please.
Crumbling café on the corner of Main,
A window seat into this dusty, nowhere town.

The rain outside slowing to a drizzle,
People mill about the cracked concrete,
Where splashes of yesterday fade
Into the lonesome pieces of
Throw-away newspaper, probably
The morning muse of an old man,
It twists with the turn of the wind,
Tripping unsuspecting pedestrians.

A copy of Poetry magazine
Keeps me company in all it’s rhetoric,
I can almost smell the side-walk vendors
On the streets of Paris
If I press myself close enough to the page.

Today I am trapped somewhere in May,
Conversations from the corner table
Fumble towards my ears, I listen
To segments of political views,
Discriminatory and vulgar to my ears.
I hear the kitchen door close near-by
And a waitress asks the debaters if
They’d fancy refills of their coffee.

The longing settles into my chest,
Not just for tea with too much sugar,
Nor discreetly for the blessing of
An empty page and a felt-tipped pen.
I long for a beach on the coastal edge
Of some tropical peninsula,
Beach towel spread in the sun,
Umbrella, margarita, sea-side stillness, poetry.