Lunch at the Molly Pitcher Inn

I squint against
the brightness of early-afternoon
beyond the picture window,
because the man at the table to my right
is alone and ordering for two: She’s stuck
at the train tracks. We’ll both
have the chicken, and the man
at the table to my left has
a tributary of dried blood trailing
from his ear. He is laughing,
which makes it worse
because I know he knows
what is sad about this place,
what is sad about a wife who
can’t quite look at you
in focus.

And they know
Autumn is poorer in hope
than winter, because
they know what will come.
The beginning
is so far from the end
that it is an end in itself.

My grandmother’s skin hangs looser on her arms
than I remember. She tugs down fleece sleeves
when she notices I’m looking.
My soup has cooled, my spoon
forgotten and limp
among the onions.

Outside, vacant docks line the Navesink
and cold little houses huddled on a hill
remember the cranberries and cobalts
that painted their faces in
hungrier days.