Writing at the Waffle House
(first published in Main Street Rag)

My waitress pours the maple syrup
on my triple stack of flapjacks as she reads
over my shoulder and asks in a raspy voice,
“What’s that?” I tell her it’s a poem.
She snorts and strides away.

In five minutes she refills my coffee cup
and drenches my dwindling stack
with more syrup. She asks if I’ll write a poem
for her. With my mouth full, I just nod sure.
She wants verse about the ultimate high

she got from killing her old man. Grinning
at me, she confides he looked like me
with bushy red hair and brash moustache.
Only three years did she serve in the can.
The judge told her that the bastard had it coming.

With a look of transcendence, she says,
“The poison took hours to finish him off,
and I had the longest and best orgasm
a woman has ever had.” I start writing
the poem like my life depends on it.