cafe

Insignificance

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

I watch the line of people accumulate,
a metaphor in front of me. Because nothing

can exist without some deeper meaning.
How people walk in and out of my life

in this coffee shop and I obsess on
the butterfly effect. I occupy a table,

but there are five open tables. I drink
from a mug, but there are many mugs.

How can everything mean anything
in such insignificance? The chatter

grows louder. I need follow-up reports
for every single person who steps

inside while I am here, especially
those who look and leave quickly.

I need to know how my insignificance
becomes significant– a small gust,

somewhere.

(originally published in Toasted Cheese Literary Journal, Winter 2023)

At Azorean Café

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

The party behind me laughs
in my sadness. The blue walls hang
hook in me. Even the painted violets–
islands. How can a restaurant make
my table larger? I am spreading out–
a tendonless goo– and still, the
server checks on me. I swear she says
have the Portuguese custard carcass.

(originally published in The Los Angeles Review of Los Angeles, Summer 2020)

For Once I’d Like to Hear You Over My Brain

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

The endless universe of this coffee-church
I blend into the ground, ground
anxiety into yours, I met you there, pit-

pattering footsteps I couldn’t stop
listening to. I asked myself
if this was a joke

the way only nervous nothing I said
to you.         Yah-yah-yah.
I am awake, I know

over this river I
Jesus-walk miraculously
you reach your hand

to me–
             cold, wet illness.
             Neither of us are

here.

(originally published in Academy of the Heart and Mind, Winter 2021)

In This Cafe You Thought You’d Find Solace from This World

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

through speakers 70s music bass
guitar heartbeat pulsating through
a weatherman chants forecasts out
of sync a microwave beeps the shrill
coffee machines trembling cash
register slamming baritone voice
barista says he has bad hearing you
said something before sandwich fan
spins no rhythm stringed spurt richochet
solos quiet everyone reading books
tablets not responding to chaos burnt
bagel wafting sorry sorry the window
rain begins drum drum drum drum
one two three four the faucet spits
on everyone walks in don’t you
want somebody to love?

 

(originally published in IthacaLit, Spring 2018)

Young Skeletons

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

the baristas grind bones into coffee
in these cafes I call skeleton closets

this golden-brown-haired babe stands by my table
her laced leggings draw desire with a fine ballpoint pen

her head whips to me from some psychic seventh sense
she is my ex-girlfriend’s brother’s future ex

her eyes descend as B-movie UFOs
attraction vacuums neatly into a plastic bag

she sits with me like a pocketed thunderstorm
galvanized on The Great Wall of Chain-Link

you must believe me she says
there are no hard feelings

a poacher must say the same
beside a rhino’s castrated face

she asks if I come here often
I say I come hard everyday

just the flickering moon will summon the wolf
and we emulate its growls in fluorescent light

time is our species’ one enduring invention
a new carcass will not survive the night

so hold on to your corpse for as long as you can
until we mourn with our friends the forgetting

(originally published in The Broken Plate, Spring 2016)