I Sit at the Food Court in a Colossal Shopping Mall
To Have a Quick Lunch on a Friday Afternoon
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Indian sounds good today
The tongue-stinging pepper
And the chakra-opening curry
The mere thought of someone spending
A whole night cooking
A pot of chicken delights me
I eat my food gingerly
Balancing the white plastic spoon
Tasting the time & the chef’s expertise
In each and every bite
A gigantic American flag hangs
A hundred feet over the ice rink
Where children skate
Like little happy birds
Flying on the day’s emptiness
I open my favorite book of poetry
Indulging myself for a moment
In those reckless days of childhood
I am coming to the sad part of a poem
When a brawny, unsmiling girl with coarse
Blonde hair sits at the next table
Her back side facing me
And three inches of her butt cleavage
Invades my meditation
I can almost count the freckles
Decorating the shadowy, unapologetic fissure
I did not laugh
I closed my book and ponder
The new fashion
The lunch was good
:4/15/05
