Peter Chapman Poetry

coffee


I'll see you in my dreams she said
then they let the gate down
unplugged the coffee
-John Ashbery

behind me as i sipped, craving desolation, a man said "Sir,
do you have a cell phone, I have to reach my doctor"
with the oval tones and round stare of one,
you imagine, who would fumble the phone earnestly

having no phone i said i was sorry
then turned to the window and saw a young woman
with carefree hairdo
look at her phone as she hurried past
inverse to what seemed her crying
following her long nose, evading lying?

opera played in the shop

a man leaned on his hand at a table
then was gone

i'll have a pound of rainforest organic, if you please,
that the muse might further avail
from the crashing tops of those highmonkey trees