Hi Paul:
Greetings from Manhattan. The downtown café has been a part of New York life for more than a century — a place of quiet refuge from the stresses of the city. Here is “Café Candles” from my 2008 poetry collection, Father of Water.
Best wishes,
Charles Pierre
Paris. Candles in “a place of quiet refuge” as described by Charles Pierre, poet. Paul Goldfinger photo.©
Café Candles
By Charles Pierre.
An hour past sunset, the sky gone gray,
a waiter with a tray of candles balanced
on his palm circles this intimate room,
placing a flame at the center of each table,
the lights casting aureoles around the faces
of casually seated couples and threesomes,
and even the solitaire clutching a book
who burns with isolation in his corner.
As evening deepens and the sky darkens,
each candle becomes a central point
for the rhythms of talk and silent thought,
each table a star in the modest constellation
of this room, patrons entering and leaving,
the waiter serving and clearing the tables
of all but those small candles, which flicker
at each disturbance of the air, then recover
to blades of brightness, portioning this space
and its speech against the black canyons beyond.
CARLOS GARDEL