(day 91)
at the coffee shop
outside, yellow leaves, dull silver skies, rain.
the city bus slides across the glistening asphalt
a woman rushes down the avenue huddled in her raincoat clutching her purple umbrella.
im seated across a thirtysomething with an open macbook and a bowl-sized cup
and in between us an infinity of air
beside her the lady with white hair and red jacket packs up her bag
and no sooner has stood and she is replaced by two college students with their thick framed glasses and ironic sweaters
a couple beside them with dark eyes and black jackets and the next seat over a professor wipes his glasses and scribbles on a notepad
and the matriarch with with the dangling murmurring in spanish to the youth in the plaid shirt
i can hear the coffee grinder
i can hear the thirtysomething playing with her hair
i can feel strangerness and aloneness and foreverness and the cool air rush in
when someone opens the door to come in or out
there are tiny pumpkins and yellow gourds decorating the wooden counters
there is an infinity of air
there is the strangerness
there are all of these stories and people and there is rain and yellow leaves just beyond the glass
a man in a weatherbeaten jacket lifts the tiny cup of cortado to his nose and inhales deeply
where are we truly?
where are we going?
what is this life, passing?
am i watching a film of a life occur or am i really here?
what does it mean to be here and what do we become when we step out of the glass door and into the rain?
what is this aloness and this strangerness and this infinity of air?
will i remember the matriarch murmurring spanish to the youth in plaid, will I remember the way the professor rubs his brow ponderous as he flips through the yellow pages?
will i remember the thirtysomething in her salmon striped sweater? will i remember anything
when my body breaks at last
and i succumb