At the diner at 4 a.m.,

cheesecake and coffee

the brew so dusty sweet

and the cake real ricotta.

At the diner, we’d talk

after the bars close

and the beer wore off,

and eat French fries

or eggs and put dimes

in the table top juke box,

hear our favorite songs

like Free bird and

Sympathy for the Devil.

And we’d splay our

legs on long, red, vinyl

seats sometimes cracked,

our backs against booth

walls of plastic sheen.

At the diner, we’d hum

the songs we heard at the

bar we just left, our favorite

local bands playing, while

we drank Heineken and

smoked Camel cigarettes,

out back for a J or two.

But under the bright lights

of the diner til quarter to 7 or

later, we’d laugh sometimes

spitting our coffee or Pepsi

at some stupid shit one of us

said, and everything’s funny

when you haven’t slept all night.

At the diner, off the expressway,

the waitresses know us, and

bring us our eggs and toast

the way we like them, sunny

side up and easy tan and grape

jelly in the little plastic peel off

boxes, three or four of them.

And every Friday and Saturday

it was the same for us three,

Deb, Jackie and me, at the diner.