Sunday, March 02, 2008

Black Coffee

It's been a while since I've posted any poetry. Honestly, I haven't written much since I graduated, but it is still something that I really enjoy. While flipping through a notebook to begin writing a Bible Study today, I found this poem that I wrote a month or two ago in a coffee shop. I really appreciate how the meaning still connects with me months after I wrote it, and it has even taken on new forms of meaning that I couldn't have had in mind when I wrote it. Such is the nature and beauty of poetry.

Black Coffee

There’s a soft folk song on the radio.
The feminine melody has me wanting to fall in love.
“Sometimes I pray for you” connects deep down
and gives me hope that I’m not alone. Gives
me hope that I’m not the only one longing
to be joined—pulled out of the lonely abyss
to empathy and passion and mirrored selflessness.

I take my coffee black.
B – L – A – C – K
It is the purest color.
P – U – R – I – T – Y

It is the most pleasingly bitter taste my tongue
has ever interpreted. I cannot help but find
sweet comfort in the physical.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

mmm. thats nice.

i wish i had something more insightful to say.

you reminded me of something random. today i found a book in my classroom about a sheep named poe. which made me think of edgar allen poe. and about how if he wrote a poem or story about a sheep, it would probably be too violent and disturbing for me to read at school. poe. what a weird name for a sheep.

Melanie said...

nice poem. i used to write more than i do now as well. glad you're finding comfort in the solitude. hope all is well.

just for a laugh- last night my dream included one of the elders from my home church with dredlocks! I think I miss the hippie-ness of Asheville.