The awakening

Mate!

Life shines in the sun.

I’m in the café.  

The letter I wrote you last night

I don’t know whether to send. 

They’re different words to a different friend. 

The interview with Jesus and Mary Chain.  Remember? 

Hanging around, filling time till you die.  

Falling off a cliff at the end.  What’s the point?

But today is another day. 

Woke straight from the dream

of a schoolmate.  Centre-forward,

past his best, too heavy to run down the

crowded Metro and connect with a cross

he’d have put away in his youth. 

A striped jersey of morning sun

graces the table.   Sol y sombra. 

Impromptu-intercambio: café y tostada.

The camareras helped me explain

why I came an hour early.

(I saved the bit about the centre-forward) 

In exchange I gave them “tray”, “counter”,

 “coffee, café, cafeteria”, as my toast caught fire. 

They’ll love you, mate. 

You’ll love their laughter.

And the gloom of last night’s self-aware?

It’s fair, I guess, unless you’re a committed afterlifer. 

My uncle discovered the truth this week.  RIP.

But, surely, a single moment like this, or yours,

lolling in the garden of dreams with your love,

has got to be worth the awakening.

Buendia.