Tonight's Poet Corner: Coffee Basket

Coffee Basket
by Belinda Roddie

I prepared a little basket, and it's got
a tiny bag of coffee for everyone
in my apartment complex. There's dark roast
for Bill upstairs, with the stereo blistering his ears,
canceling out any corked or uncorked regrets he's had

in his life. Hazelnut for Missus Ginger with the
pear-shaped nose on the second floor,
sorting out her jewelry collection
one turquoise at a time. And espresso

for the sharpest tongued, fifteen-year-old,
sci-fi-obsessed girl I've ever met, whose name
seems to change every week to me, with the UFO

full blazon on her black shirt where the cartoon cosmos
are ironed on just right on the fabric. Joe's not too

strong for her, either, because when she
invites me into her family's apartment, brews
the stuff right in front of me, and drains it
from the porcelain mug, her eyes light up

into a thousand handfuls of stardust -
the kind you can scoop up with a spoon
and stir into a cup, hot as a galaxy, to
energize you when half the day's disintegrated.