Coffee Shop to Go

If the person in the corner
Of the cafe has a notebook
And alternates between scribbling
And staring out of the window,

Are they journaling or trying
To compose lyrics? A poet?
What if that were exactly what
It takes to create an epic?

Not saying it is, but what if?
A real epic, gods and heroes
In some kind of regular verse,
Not just a cartoon universe—

A notebook and a window seat
For suburban future Homers,
And there’d be guaranteed content
Revered millenniums to come.

The person peers out the window,
Then scribbles another something.
You used to carry small notebooks.
You sat by windows and scribbled.

You’d be scared to find those notebooks.
No epics in yours, that’s for sure.
What a library could be made,
If all the notebooks of scribbles

Of all the world, but only those,
No printed books, no sacred scrolls,
Were gathered onto walls of shelves,
Tomb of introspective Babel.

Outside it starts to rain again.
You pick up your order and go.
Someday, there’ll be no more notebooks—
Deep thoughts, maybe, still. No windows.