Special

 

Special
 
You can’t help but
watch them quarrel
about their ‘relationship’
as she calls it
while your coffee steams.
She finally says
“Can you tell me I’m special in any way?”
and he says
“I’ll think about it”
and you and everybody
at all the tables are silently urging
—Leave now, sweetie—
but she keeps badgering
“Tell me one way I’m special”
and he says
“I’m still thinking”
and she says
“Tell me!”
while his cheeks are slick with tears
“Tell me!”
until she rises from her chair
leans across the tiny table
kissing
solemn as a saint
deep as a canyon
slow as an era
and you have to look away.
Your coffee, everybody’s coffee
needs warming.

…..

First published in Red Eft Review. Thank you editor Corey Cook.
Note: I wrote this poem not because I understand it but because I don’t. I was simply a witness. Now the poem is witness, too. And you.