3. Thursday at Topanga

Thursday at Topanga we would sit and face each other;
hard lines over cups of steaming coffee, maybe a chocolate chip cookie
unwrapped next to the plate. Steaming too, of course. 
Recently removed from the blazing oven. But where were we? Our
sad ritual, once a month where we'd pretend to know each other,
dreaming of a connection lost when they invented telephones. 
Actually, probably when they first invented phones with flashy
yellow cases, neon in their desires to pull us apart.

As humans, you know. The coffee cups keep steaming, 
trying to give us something to talk about besides silence.

This Thursday would be like every other before it, an
open bracket of days unending; the cavern between our 
packed little hearts. Packed with stories we will never tell, tapping their
aching hands against the hardened muscle walls. Clenched so
no more can escape. No more than that first call, the first
grasping at straws, the first time you called me (on a neon yellow phone)
asking for coffee. 

Billie Williams' thursdays at topanga, Yan Wang's 3.