I'm young and poor,
Sitting here all alone
not knowing where you went,
The free water cup in front
of your chair is empty
and mine is
barely half full,
Being spent in sips
as the cigarette smoke
whirls in the room,
creating a haze
and leaving a daze
in my eyes,
the old lonely man
to my left
is writing a novel,
I stop him to look,
groveling,
“and what about you?”
he laughs,
“it's a story about
the time I crashed
my ship in the pacific ocean,
I didn't have any
sunscreen lotion so
the vision I had
shortly after
was a hallucination
of a beautiful
mermaid woman,
She helped me swim halfway
to a beach before my energy
was lost and I was put to sleep,
After that,
She spoke without speech,
She swam without
a breech in waves,
she stayed by my side for days,
I laid on her fin until I
found myself sunken,
rib like projections
coming from my throat
which filled my lungs
in the dark water
I was so afraid of,”
What happened
next surprised me,
I didn't think,
I took my cup
and with the last
of my money
I filled the drink
with coffee,
I glanced at
the thirsty old man
as I walked
out the door,

His laugh still
echoes in my
memory.