THE SERIAL SOBRIQUETIST

 

Nobody knows

but her.

 

Not the barista

behind the counter.

 

Not anyone standing

in line. Not even  

 

those who are waiting,

like her, to collect

 

their drink order.

She does it solely

 

to entertain herself,

to make life

 

a little less

hum-drum,

 

a little less

run-of-the-mill,

 

you might say.

She takes

 

an ordinary event,

like getting

 

a cup of coffee,

and turns it

 

into something

silently sensational

 

by infusing it with

some good old-fashion

 

imagination. The barista

sets her drink

 

on the counter

and barks like

 

an auctioneer

to no one in particular,

 

Norton. Our heroine,

feeling a bit

 

like a child shoplifter

stealing a pack of Wrigley’s

 

from the corner drug store

unnoticed,

 

sweeps in to scoop

up her drink,

 

now donning a name

that’s not hers.

 

Her fake-name is 

her little secret.

 

Her artful

improvisation.

 

Today it’s Norton

tomorrow

 

it may be Everest 

or MacGuffin.

 

Her whimsy will

decide - which

 

reminds me

of the prank, Pessoa,

 

the great Portuguese poet

would pull 

on hot summer days

in Lisbon: he would 

toss his blue wool hat

to strangers

in the street

to watch them

 

become a little 

less strange

as their hands 

fumbled nervously, 

poetically

to make the catch.

 

Her fake-coffee-name is

her way of making herself

 

a little less strange

in a world that keeps

 

getting alarmingly stranger

one prosaic day at a time.