Back to Issue Seven.

Avalanche Café

BY DENVER BUTSON

 

as far as I know
there is no such place
as The Avalanche Café

there is no barista there
with dust on her lapels
no manager with crushed rock
on his mustache

as far as I know
there is no such place

with bruised and bleeding patrons
and tiny coffees that must taste extra good
after a disaster

after you think you might not ever
taste coffee again

no such place exists
as far as I know

but if it did
the bell above the door
just rang

and I imagine you just walked in
looking a lot better
than I would have expected you to look

after all that has happened
after all that keeps happening.

Denver Butson has published three books: triptych (The Commoner Press, 1999), Mechanical Birds (St. Andrews Press, 2001), and Illegible Address (Luquer Street Press, 2004). His work appears in The Yale Review, Ontario Review, Caliban, Quarterly West, and Exquisite Corpse. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.

More by Denver Butson: 
“Avalanche Café,” Poetry, Issue Seven.
“The Sky Erotic,” Poetry, Issue Seven.
“Rain’s Idea of Cinema,” Poetry, Issue Seven.
“Rain’s House,” Poetry, Issue Seven.