- Benjamin Wolff
“The Theatre Café”
This poem was originally published on The Pittsburgher’s predecessor, The Dog Door Cultural.
Losing hours among
plastic flowers
and electric candles
which flicker artificially,
there is a strange sort of comfort.
A wooden veneer
stained with the rings
of countless conversations
smiles, denials
and sudden transmutations.
Watermarks,
the imprints of distant and forgotten heat
faint evidence of lived bodies and human meat.
A myriad of messages
demarcated in the wood.
Yet,
all I wonder is why no one bothered to use a coaster.
The place is peopled
with young laughter
amid antagonisms
of relaxed and hurried chatter.
Coffee cups clatter
against ceramic plates.
The grinding of coffee
fills the room with its
electric hum.
Yet, above all this noise
pervades an
unmistakable silence.
Plastic flowers and electric candles.
But, at least the walls are made of glass.
Static plastic confronted by ever moving life.
Sat in the inescapable visibility
chewing pencil ends and sipping coffee
there is a strange lack of comfort. ▲
Benjamin Wolff is currently an MSc student at the University of Edinburgh studying Modernist Aesthetics and also the current poetry editor of Inkwell Magazine.