Outside the Diner It’s Slowly Getting Dark

by Tim Suermondt

Ash/Unsplash

And slowly the man eats his hamburger steak—and twirling his fork around in the mashed potatoes so well ballerinas

might be impressed. A daily tabloid is on the booth seat— he plans on taking his time reading it, moving it a bit closer.

He’s ready and not ready for anything, hard to explain but true. As he rubs his eyes with his handkerchief his inner voice arrives

like a spirited companion he once had, telling him to “Watch the last light of the day slither between the tenement houses.

Watch people—going everywhere, everywhere. Have the pie a la mode for old time’s sake. Don’t become too lonesome.”

---

Tim Suermondt is the author of four full-length collections of poems, the latest one The World Doesn’t Know You. His fifth collection, Josephine Baker Swimming Pool, is out from MadHat Press. He has published in Poetry, Ploughshares, The Georgia Review, Prairie Schooner, Able Muse and Plume, among many others. He lives in Cambridge with his wife, the poet Pui Ying Wong.