The Greenery of Beans

The Greenery of Beans
By Christopher J. Bradley
3/6/01 6:17:34 PM

A cup of coffee isn't as simple as it looks
There is so much time in preparation
It has to start at the roots of a plant
Somewhere warm
Say for example
In Columbia or Guatemala.

Then it grows into a
Ferning vessel
That is carpentered
By the hands of workers who live
Subsistantly from the land.

They carry their satchels
Northward
Using horses and mules
To dispatchers
Who prepare and pack the kernels
To bring them to cafés.

There is more of a dynamic
In a café than you might realize
The clerk behind the counter
Might have been a customer for years
While poets and actors gather 'round
To share their hopes and fears
The game players find themselves there
Imbibing in the fruit
Of laborers beyond the line
Toiling in the South.

I drink it all in once again
The scenery and the scene
While writing on this tissue
Through crystalline caffeine
The people all around and about
Are the greenery of the beans.