lo-fi poetics: 4th st berkeley ca

with & for anna

day after the summer solstice people watching 

window shopping & the weather can't get much better

i watch the human comedy as if i were a non-player-character

but that would be wrong so i go inside peet's coffee

because i need to pee + i want a cup of ordinary black coffee

back outside we sit at the table as we figure out the rest of our day

slight breeze sunny the smell of freshly cooked food young people 

selling baked goods to raise money for their organization

while i notice across the street a pair of alphorn players so awful

that honking car horns would be better music

while a growing collection of grey-haired populists 

with their protest signs cluster on the street corner

& my coffee is so bad it is like licking a dead battery