that we’re sharing a beer, amber work
of art on the outdoor table,
tipped into frosted glass, each of us
claiming half the head like spindrift
fuming over waves’ edge, before we open
books and read on in afternoon silence.
Maybe for you it is Twelfth Night plus
the latest Anne Sexton. Maybe for me
odd inspiration found in the 1850 Prelude.
Right up to the point we turn books spines-up
to argue pros and cons of housewives
with male shrinks, Mr. Wordsworth’s not knowing
how to leave well enough alone.
Maybe this is just how it has to be with two
would-be poets, anchored to habits
more than a half century ago while around us
Kerouac kids gather words like hubcaps
and gum wrappers, and there are no distractions
buzzing in from other planetary spaces.
Convivial hours of soft intimacy, willing
surrender to another pair of eyes,
time and agendas, accountants and shop girls
passing by us in this ghost café in the Village
or is it the Wharf?
And maybe I’m not inventing too, the silver
pancake stack of quarters, ample supply
for courting a few hours of poetry and poverty.
Coins traded for the final bottle of beer poured
to the top of the glass, sipped to the bottom,
and then it’s time to close books, come to our feet.
Whether we laugh or not, I won’t speculate,
but both of us must go separate ways, calculating
as always what the inexact lines of our lives
mean and how much money we left on that table.