This Isn'T a Poem

It suddenly struck me as I sat in my familiar chair towards the back of the white buzzing café, a hazelnut terzetto staring up at me, it struck me what Magritte was trying to tell us when he painted “This Is Not A Pipe” below the dark strokes of a brown bowl and black stem, a slight glare the only sign of life beyond it. He wasn’t pointing out what was real and not with a wave of disdain to the perplexed viewer but, rather, was underlining what most of us are too frightened to admit, that everything is what we make of it – or not – and objects have no preference as to the labels spectators cook up. And I will leave you with that slippery nugget, close the spinach leaf I was scribbling in, take a last sip of the faded photograph before me and step out into the foggy rush hour bee hive, this life vest slipped carefully into my coat pocket.