Sitting in a diner booth
Is cozy and inviting.
To me, such places are, in truth,
The tables most delighting.
When offered booth or table,
There’s no contest; I will choose
A booth which will enable
Me to chill out and enthuse.
At dinner, I like atmosphere
And candlelight and chairs,
A place to sip an ice-cold beer
And wait while food prepares.
Yet for breakfast or a lunchtime meal,
My preference tends to be
A diner with the main appeal
Of booths for friends and me.
My husband likes a table most
But will not raise his voice
When we end up in, you might have guessed,
A booth. (He has no choice!)
Sitting down to diner,
Always a winner!
Can tell the family about my day.
Where I went.
Who could play!
About Billy who bit the dog,
What I found under a log.
Momma said, "Chew your food 100 times today."
Started to count every chew.
Got to 17.
Lost count,
Now what do I do?
If I start over,
I'll be here all night!
No one will hear about my first day fight!
Momma said, "Chew your food 100 times to do any good."
I looked up how many times to chew your food.
I found that 20 to 30 times is just as good!
I wonder if Momma told me 100 times,
So, I wouldn't tell her my new nursery rhyme?
In nineteen sixty-three, May twenty-eight,
three youngsters in a Woolworths five-and-dime
sat down and asked for coffee. This was war.
In Jackson, Mississippi, way back when,
outrageous things like this riled up the pack.
The photos still exist. You feel the hate.
To ask for coffee, then, was such a crime,
so unacceptable to local law
that men (look at the photos – they’re all men)
could not restrain themselves. Attack, attack!
With ketchup, mustard, butter they went straight
to smear the interlopers with their slime:
what else are coffee-grounds and soda for?
The heroes (in the age of Colonel Glenn,
the Right Stuff mattered) took down from the rack
more gunge. These sons of the Magnolia State
poured vinegar in solemn pantomime
(one wiped molasses on the young man’s jaw).
What caused this ritual? This zoo-like zen?
The guests had the effrontery to be black.
She sent back the last order, as well.
This time, she shook her head
like a dog in the rain,
like a posh-frock woman
having "a spell."
The brimming broth, she said,
had a bitterness that swelled
and stung between her cheeks,
and across her tongue.
It steamed with the scent
of turmeric and sweat,
a lipstick kiss in the basement
of the Red Grotto Used Bookstore,
of a Dominican girl, half her age,
in skin jeans and red sneakers,
pulling her by the hand
during Summer City Lit Festival
last year.
She claimed she craved the
steaming heat of our menu's
Andean soup,
but bones like razors waited
when she raised the brim
of the bowl to her lips.
Just like the wine she sent back,
she said that the broth bit her lip
with a vicious grin
when she closed her eyes,
opened wide,
leaned in,
and tried to love it
with the whole of her mouth.
She bestowed a belgard from across the diner.
It was rich and warm, like the bowl of buttery grits that steamed the hairs in my nostrils.
Then suddenly an invisible magnet slowly pulled my hungry eyes from my breakfast toward her pretty brown eyes, which gently spoke to me.
Albeit short, the moment was sweet and endearing.
For maybe 5 seconds, our eyes met, and then they embraced for a symphonic dance.
It was such a sweet suite that felt like heaven.
Then the cashier handed her her receipt and change.
And suddenly, I was no longer in a catatonic state.
My attention returned to the breakfast that awaited me as she gracefully exited the diner.
In passing, she smiled and coyly waved as she vanished into the cold January day.
Place to eat
I can’t say Evanston Diner can’t be beat
Location being the town of Evanston, Wyoming
Bound for Los Angeles, California
A stop on Greyhound Bus
You know the slogan, “Leave the Driving to us”
Limited food
There was no need to drool
Hamburger last
Had to be ordered fast
That was all that was available
Greyhound buses that passed through had cleaned out the Evanston Diner of food
Later the Greyhound bus pressed on
Back on the road again
Welcome to the fifty’s diner
Where there are chrome stools
Black, red and white leather seats
A checkered floor
Everything matches
A soda machine is standing ready
The chef is heating up the fryer
Burgers and fries are the main stay
The waitress has filled the ketchup bottles
There are also mustard bottles, and salt and pepper shakers
Staff is ready for school to dismiss
So, the munching, and conversing can begin.
Janice is as fresh and pretty as a fifties diner
That opened a week ago, said Cuz.
We saw her sitting at the counter
And we saw how fresh and crisp she was
Her freshly-washed pin-curls give her that fifties look.
We wonder if she is related to the hostess or the cook?
Janice gives us a smile and we recognize once again.
What a gorgeous fifties place, we have fallen in.
Heather, Oh Heather
The worst waitress ever
Whenever will you come back to me?
I sit here forever
No service is rendered
And never do ever complain
Heather, Oh Heather
It’s so hard to remember
And it’s easy as pie to forget
With so many orders
And Special de Jours
If only you could find your pen
Heather, Oh Heather
It sez here in the paper
That people are where they eat
Together, they’ll find us
Alone in the diners
Apart from the lives we lead
Heather, Oh Heather
The worst waitress ever
The service was splendored today
We’ll take us together
Away and forever
And never will ever complain
a-lot-a money
how you run it
doesn’t want her to go
Seen ‘‘em leave
like rookie pro
an automat whose orbs of light
reflect and touch the void of night
a refuge from the twenties’ roar
trapped in her thoughts without a door
a table, cup and gloveless hand
alone together in her land
a bowl of fruit that sits behind:
the 'still life' and her state of mind.
The door rings
I look up
then
back to my eggs and hash browns.
The door rings
I look up
nobody I know,
my first time here
why should I know anyone!
Back to the eggs.
Two sunny-side-up,
the busting of yellow yokes
with a tip of toast --- O Lordy.
I look up
the waitress has bodacious tats,
a phone bursts into song
another vibrates
as loud as a sleeping panther.
The door rings
creamy salutations
of comfort and grease.
Spoons jangle on tinkling handles,
spatulas knell upon the griddle.
A buttery booth crush
a flush-faced coffee klatch.
The skinny cook yells in Kentucky Yiddish.
I look up
flapjacks slap air
syrup pours and dongs in jug and jar.
The door chants and chimes -
Hallelujah for this ring-a-ding diner
and our Waffle House hunger.
Hang a left, clunker rocking
on sprung shocks.
Inside,
narrows taper to booths.
The place is slow-time empty.
The staff talk is griddle speech,
a blow by blow banter,
middle finger smarts mixed with
vowels of regrets.
From the lips of waitresses
the clipped history
of shaky affairs
and dead-loss dudes.
False gods named,
Tod, Ricky, and Wayne
a bruised chatter -
ankle-swelling narrations
that break apart unfulfilled.
Food arrives with a woman,
dimples nap in work-weary cheeks.
Her necklace is ink,
yet it hangs over glancing eyes
as a low-cut caress.
She knows I’ve been listening,
yet continues unabashed
a colloquy with my senses.
reciting by rote a silent
'tip-me-big' love spell.
On the way to the New Jersey Shore,
make a stop there if you never have before.
Travel eastward along U. S. Route 30,
you will find this place that will be easy to see.
It's located in the town of Hammonton, New Jersey.
In the morning, you will never have fluffier pancakes.
In the evening, they have tender and juicy steaks.
There are very few places that are finer.
Stop and check out the Silver Coin Diner.
The Warmth of a Winters Dinner
David J Walker
The blackened cast-iron caldron
Sat on the stove burner waiting for
The task to begin
the water and the low flame
taking its time
all day to claim
a winters meal
It would begin in the morning
with onion joined by
carrots and celery
Chopped on the butcher's block
In bite-sized portions
Adding a bag
of frozen peas
then
Salt and pepper
Eight cups of water
And cubed up pieces of
A frozen round steak, all
Bathed in a tomato paste
For a long-days simmer
The aroma of the low boiling
Flavors escaping the heave lid
Filling the house with the flush scent of
Each ingredient adding its
Own unique element of perfection for
The winters dinner to come
The smell of cornbread baking
In the oven invited everyone to
The warmth of the
Heart of the hearth
Where portions of the stew
would be dished into
the blue ceramic bowls we
knew well and used
all of our lives
The cold outside was held
At bey that night
in the warmth of
A winters dinner
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