I'm sitting
on the sidewalk
back against an iron fence
in the sun

beside me
on the ground
is a cup of coffee
from the Hard Times Café

its cooling
now
and almost gone

I’m scrawling
indecipherable words
into a beat up notebook, sketches
of the moment, brush strokes
attempted with a turn of phrase
that doesn’t want to turn

unexpectedly, a wheel
rolls down the sidewalk
barely missing my foot

it pulls
the attention
out of my head

I look up
to see an old Indian guy
with long black hair and wrinkles
grinning right through me, showing me
his broken teeth

he sits
in a wheel chair, rolling
through time, making animal noises
at the poet on the sidewalk
like a crazy man
he chortles

laughs at the wideness
of my startled eyes

behind him
a younger man
with lit-up face
pushes the chair

he’s also staring, grinning
at my image
down on the ground, probing me
with black eyes, his wild orbs
of laughter, possessed
by a private joke

he leans
toward me and makes
a swiping gesture at my coffee cup
at my cheap tobacco
on the ground beside me
in a plastic bag

then he laughs
like a lunatic and passes
into the future

three paces back
of the men, a woman
smiles at me
and says, "how you doing?"

I return
the smile and proclaim
I do just fine
but at the same time
I note the hard life and years
written on her friendly face

as she moves along, I watch her
fading
into the sun’s hot glare

I try to coin a phrase
about her beauty in the light
of the moment, about the beauty
of them all

but the moment disappears

07/14/2006

Posted on 07/14/2006
Copyright © 2026 Jim Benz