Starbucks Confession
2 Minutes Read Time
Summer Assistant Editor Arah Ko: How much do small interactions shape our lives? In Che’s poem, a brief brush with a coffee shop barista becomes a portal through which we can ponder distance and proximity. The poem asks the devastating question, “How many times have I mistaken closeness / for love?” The physical nearness of a stranger contrasts with their stark emotional separation—even the speaker’s own hands flex with intimacy and distance, “finding only each other in the dark.” Through lyric as lush and secret as a dream, this poem reminds me how we can be surrounded by others and still be lonely.
Listen to Lyn read the piece:
Starbucks Confession
As I move to grab my coffee, I graze the barista’s ring.
Pause there. How many times have I mistaken closeness
for love? I envy shelved books, their abutting (narcosis-
inducing, really), to say nothing of sardines, crowds massing
like wildebeests. Also, lapped seams. The water droplets merging
thick on the rainy windshield—I love licking them off, gaucheness
being my pond of choice: the one I skate over, flawless,
at the edge of sleep. That he could be there, in the clearing
between the reeds. The barista. White-throated. His hair raked black.
The distances I would unlearn: light-years, horse lengths, spans.
I’d build a cathedral to touching, all pinnacles and arcs.
Instead, I wake to an echoing apartment, desire slack
in my mouth. Night pressing in. The thrushes of my hands
jabbering, finding only each other in the dark.
