Cafes with their deep sofas,
electrical outlets and people communicating
on keyboards, books, blank paper
(but not with each other)
are pleasantly lonely places.
For as long as I’ve been writing
I've been drawn again and again
by the cafe’s power to capture my focus
--and I wonder, do minds function
best amid noisy arrangements
of people preoccupied with devices?
Because distractions, whether mundane
ones such as letting out the dog or big ones
like depression, with its repetitive thinking,
Can only be conquered by sitting in a cafe,
where the moment I stand in line
to order a green tea latte
everything in my life waits at the door,
dares not follow me in, knowing it will be ignored,
will cease to exist, and so I wonder,
Is the ability to focus
(if not to be happy) most possible
in a realm one does not own,
among strangers, where one is a guest,
and nothing is asked of her
and where she can do nothing at all
about anything except write?
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