The coffee shop rattles with cacophonic sounds.
They shake the room and agitate airs
the way a gust might flurry motes drifting
frantic in sudden whirlpools of wind.
I settle in a corner and let the agitation break against me,
caught by currents that pull me under
drowning serene in smoky waters
you walk through.
The clatter of chitchat flows
waves that lap the crowd
friendly flotsam of the here-and-now
babbles of plastic
pinks and reds and greens
that sparkle the heated room
as swirling waters catch us,
pulling us out to sea.
Janet Butler relocated to the Bay Area in 2005 after many years in central Italy. She teaches Test Prep to foreign students in San Francisco, and lives in Alameda with Fulmi, a lovely Spaniel mix she rescued in Italy and brought back with her. Some current or forthcoming publications are Mason’s Road, Assisi, Caduceus, and The Quotable. Her poems have placed for the third consecutive year in the Bay Area Poetry Coalition’s annual contest. Her most recent chapbook is Searching for Eden from Finishing Line Press.
Fantastic! Coffee shop likened to sea. I love coffee shops – I search for them where ever I go – now I know why. Yet now I’ll be sorry not to meet someone there – he or she bringing in the tide. Excellent read.