Receipt: Poem

Receipt

‘Would you like the sea?’

I say yes,

puzzled.

Tamp,

and another afternoon’s second coffee –

she is Russian, or Ukrainian,

and so I realise she said receipt.

‘I gave you a hard time earlier today,’

her Indian boss says, alongside

the machine where she’s making my milk

bluff.

And she, ‘Not so much,’ and gives

half a shrug

he doesn’t see because of his espresso sip.

‘Excuse me,’ says the man after paper towels

– on the counter, by the water – the man

who has just vacated that booth

near the window I don’t want

to want so much.

I step back, in fuller possession

of something.