Title: The Café

Author: Martha Morseth

In: Sport 16: Autumn 1996

Publication details: Fergus Barrowman, March 1996, Wellington

Part of: Sport

Keywords: Verse Literature

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Sport 16: Autumn 1996

Martha Morseth — The Café

page 166

Martha Morseth

The Café

I am the one who gets there first,
the one who always waits.
I avoid cracks but can do nothing
about the shadows.

You meet me at the Percolator
for coffee and something else.
I notice that their pot plants
need watering. I say ‘yes’
to another coffee when you ask
if I have had enough of life alone.
I lust for cream, I admit, but
my slim conscience prevents such
luxuries and my thin soul warns
me against your extravagances.

I am able to forget the nightmares
but the dreams recur—double rooms,
double floor plans, duplications
of living spaces.

Should I live with you? We are
unalike and soon will hate. But that
is a solid relationship, you say.
Co-dependency can be forever.

The crocuses are pushing through
the ground, too early. Don’t force it,
I tell them. Take a lesson from me,
I never knew when to leave a party.
I always arrive too soon. The hostess
page 167 isn’t ready and her partner is still
in the shower. She glowers but lets
me in. I see that her plants want
watering. Wealth can make you
careless.

What was it you said with your fingers
as you handed me the coffee? I seem
to be slipping through the places
between the newly polyurethaned
floorboards. They reflect the tables
nicely and the customers’ teeth as
they laugh.

The night is cold, the windows are
steamed. The cafe is warm, the cream
is sweet. I see your teeth.