A One-Sided Conversation in a Coffee Shop

Too distracted to talk

To pages of poems

So I’ll just stalk

The stalkers with the face cake and combs.

 

Ginsberg can wait.

He’s waited since copyright 1956

Until this date to date.

 

Coffee’s getting old and cold so

Drink up and have another cup

And hope the cover of my book shows up

For all to see

While I concentrate on myths of other’s

Concentration on me.

 

Trapped by terrible temptresses.

No, trapped by terribly tedious tormentors

Of the mind who sit at coffee with me

And go on and on and on about

Nothing much at all.

 

Don’t be so rude.

I should bump Beelzebul’s bums

And give my undivided attention

To the poet before me. You see,

I paid him to be with me.

The others get coffee with me for free.

 

But just think of the cost of distraction.

Where is the Buddha when you need him?