Silent Fulcrum

Three steles currently hold up the thin dark brew house on Main. To my right, two old men speak of 130k and ways to stop legalization. While on my left, two aging women sit. One is trying to give the other a book on prayer while they speak of scars their bodies shouldn’t bear from jobs they should never have had to work. Above us is the la-las of Whoville floating just like the wooden tree in the corner, a still apparition beside a television of collusion. In front of that TV, the woman who sits alone is the only black woman in the coffee shop. She doesn’t look at the TV. Not once. Her book has a NEW label on the spine, likely due by the end of next month. I can’t tell who came in first, after I, into the coffee shop. Each stele is old and I’m sure in their own way fine. But, as I overhear the steles to my left and right I can’t help but hope that woman renews her library book.