A wooden panel - a verse narrative

A wooden panel

A wooden panel made of finely cut quarter-inch planks

from the same trunk is bolted, two bolts with, oh, about six

inches or so between them—each pair is bolted once, oh,

every couple of feet down the length of the large counter,

over a rubber liner to the concrete blocks of the

counter base, and it is at this counter where every

variety of human consumer rests its sweatered

arms waiting to be served. This is what paradise must be

like.  Two await coffee to share with some conversation

between them.  After what could objectively be described

an inefficient wait, the two grab their hot paper cups

and seek a corner table for intimate privacy. 

Outside, the wind whirls in cold gusts on a day in mid-March,

near spring, but today the north of the country faces an

imminent blizzard.   Skies have lowered in grey slate to near

the tree tops of the taller trees, and across a cold and

virtuous ocean and distance-lost land masses, eighty

million refugees look back to their homes to see what is

no longer visible, face a future that no longer

doles out their tomorrows into their trembling hands.  The two

find a warm corner away from the door that, with entry

or exit, channels heat-swallowing wind gusts into the

insulated interior. The two pursue their mute

conversation, laugh, tangle their legs together under

the table, and then, one says something that, from this acute

observer’s distance, appears to wound the other, and then

continues to fire off words that further wound the other. 

The two become silent.  One, in a quick, habitual

movement, pulls out a cellphone and is lost to the other,

who, as is obvious to the observer, whimpers as

though one had been a small animal and had been gravely

wounded,  allowed only enough energy and only

the nerve-connections to whimper quietly until it fades.