COFFEE

by Philip Miller

What brings us round
and also around
the spot where the pot
is set,
where I believe
we first met
gabbing over coffee,
hard
for bosses to object to
needing as they do
well-wired workers,
but as we slipped,
our eyes let
something slip
out,
and we took each other
in, quickly,
and quickly, we were
round the bend
toward café amour.
Our fellow workers
shook their heads,
watched us locked eye to eye
fortified with a liquor
hot and black and rich
though bitter around the edges,
that would keep us up
wandering streets
looking for all night coffee houses
where jazz cd's tweedled bitter-sweet
as sugared coffee, and the air smelled
of mud, joe, java-
our cup of tea-
unromantic potion
of those who make love
with their eyes open
and remember the small details
the morning after
over a fresh, steaming cup of coffee.