2 poems by Literary Starbucks
Stopping For Coffee On a Snowing Morning
Whose drink this is I think I know.
His person’s in the bathroom though;
He will not see me standing here
To watch his drink fill up with foam.
The barista must think it queer
To stop without my own drink here
Just hiding from the frosty snow
The coldest morning of the year.
She gives her ponytail a shake
To ask if there is some mistake
The only other sound’s the pour
Of drink and frappuccino shake.
I’d pay myself if it were cheap.
I take his coffee, drink it deep.
I’ve things to do before I sleep,
I’ve things to do before I sleep. The Sip Not Taken
Two drinks diverged on a yellow counter,
And sorry I could not sample both
And be one customer, long I stood
And stared at one as long as I could
And to drink it I swore an eternal oath;
Then looked at the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was creamy and frothed with air;
Though as for that the sitting there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
On a counter no hands had dirtied black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two drinks diverged on a counter, and I-
I took the one less ordered by,
And that has made all the difference. Art by Melissa Launay
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