“A Mobile Eating Place for an Abstract Perceptionist”

I glance across the eating-place

In abstract thought,

A glimmer, a gleam,

A flicker, a flutter;

The rapture of heaven,

It’s not just a dream-

The mirthful, inflated

Plate of bright pasta

Holds no obstruction

To impede posterity’s bloom-

Now is its heyday, its prime, its vigor,

Now is its rose,

All disfigured afflictions

Blow past in a gale

Over my azure bowl

Of good-natured soup

On the blustering concavity

Of my mistakenly sublime,

Edgeless, obtuse,

Pointlessly dull spoon,

Smeared and tarnished

Yet suffused with a noise

Of clinking and clanking

Over the swaggering and boasting,

And pleasing to the eye;

For this diet, this fare,

I work outward to inward

With proper utensils

Which unbeknownst to me

Foreshadowed my doom

Of the conspired intrigue

In the laid-out napkins

In a mysterious mobile tavern as such

With a council of laughter

From its wallpapered walls

And the snickering and babble

From the rows of booths

Discordant and grating

Yet bloodless and pale,

Arranged on the tables

In the confines

Of villainous entrapments

Of flattery and temptation

Emanating from the dessert menu

Leaning toward me,

Leading me down a path

Of reverse and ruin.

The rolls arrive,

Split open and buttered,

Cast a steaming, scheming warmth,

Unfeeling and naked,

A course of impassive abuse,

No evil speaking

From the circle of patrons

Could still its animation

Or move my chair.

Such a cornucopia

In a rotted wasteland

Of rules and standards

Cataloged in sanctimonious slang

Between mouthfuls of hate-

Lucky I know

It's just abstract perception,

Ever analyzed and scrutinized

For power and scope,

An activity best left

To the clever, accomplished

Gifted guilders of carping,

Faultfinding, and over-critical hosts,

Snappish and snarling

At my half-empty glasses,

Lacking service and wit,

A costume of genius

Ill-fitted and amply queer,

Encircling my table

With enticements to such slavery,

Its central essence

A perplexity of concern,

I’m careful to leave undisturbed

The inadvertent embrace

Of the racks of spices

Attending this ludicrous feast

In cartfuls of choruses

Transported and discarded

From factory to package to floor,

Flung with the uneaten fruit

Like class-suppressed fashions

Or the ketchup-stained ties

Of the obese

In an unintentional disaster,

And with overly-bitter self-admonition;

The chattering drone

Of the gossip behind

The dividing partition

That knows all things

Yet deserving of the insolent replies

From the barstools;

My abstract perceptions

Now taken away

With the dirty dishes

To be used again

In a mobile eating place

For just such an experience;

I finish my drink

And leave a large tip,

And finish my drink.

wbiro

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