The Coffee Shop

The Coffee Shop

I scoot the chair toward the print on the wall.
It’s 3 o’clock at the coffee shop.
The sun bounces off the poster print like a wing bouncing off the wind.
The poster print is of a woman. She’s not falling, flying or running.
The woman is lying,
Lying on the dead grass.
She reaches—
The woman, maybe a girl, is trapped in a two dimensional world,
Not three dimensional or four.
You heard of the fourth dimension? Yes, yes, yes. Don’t lie. Yes.
We have talked it over, swept under all the while
Sipping mocha—double shots, in a coffee shop.
At the tapping of the spoon, the ticking of the clock,
A couple now chats and bursts out in screams
“Neitzche? Bah, I’m a Kierkegaard man.”
My face wrinkles in confusion. You laugh at me—not with me.
I’m the woman in the poster print.
Frozen in time in time in the coffee shop.
I sip the light brown liquid and quickly I’m okay again.
The woman in the poster print—she rises and runs
To the gray house—old as its kind
She opens the door
Children squeal
Pots and pans collapse on the sticky wood floor.
The woman swooshes to the back yard
She drops to the hard, brown soil
Numb, frozen, paralyzed.

You touch my hand. You take my cup.
I hear no more clattering spoons, no more humming voices.
I hear you, but I’m not listening to your lulling voice
You snatch my coffee away but I still have the buzz
Through my guts
I scoot the chair back and saunter out.