She doesn’t have enough time
to bite her cinnamon and sugar ring doughnut
because she’s writing poems with a pencil.
Her blunt silver tip is busy
scribbling what her eyes are looking at:
the man at the till ordering a chocolate muffin
wearing a novelty pizza T-Shirt
fashionably too big for his frame.
He has a thick wet tongue,
teapot-for-two sized biceps,
a moustache she may one day recommend
trimming.
Her coffee is asking to be sipped
but the man just waved at a baby in a pram
and has eyes that want to phone his mum
just to say hello. I wonder if it feels intrusive
having a poem unknowingly written about you,
the bits of you that pop recorded by a stranger,
and I contemplate asking her
where she bought her sleek reusable bottle.

© Carl Burkitt 2023