Waitress Poem

The Waitress and the Poem

I had spent most of a sun-bleached day traveling in a listless caravan of geezer-driven RVs and looky-loo sedans traversing southern mountains in search of deciduous October splendor.

Don’t you just hate it when a vision crumbles? Naive lad that I am, I had supposed I’d be the only human braving the heights of the Great Smoky Mountains in the peak of leaf season—alone with the moist shush of tires turning serpentine mountain highways, the windows wide to the loam-scented brace of autumn airs, the drear and weighty mystery of low hanging clouds, the piercing intensity of sunlight burning ghostly columns through gray-cast day to ignite precious parcels of Earth’s glorious palette. But, to my dismay, hundreds of other seekers had shared the same notion. I couldn’t even find a parking space at the overlooks and trailheads. So much for communing with the gaudy-lush death, the moribund brilliance of Appalachian October. By the time I exited the western portal of the National Park and cruised into the congested commerce of Gatlinburg, I was one road-fatigued vagabond seemingly lost from the intended purpose of his journey. But, who was I, or for that matter,who are any of us to assume we grasp the mandate of a day’s travel until after the miles are spent and we settle into a dimly lit corner of Night’s Inn and reflect upon our deeds?

I’ll never know her name or the warm and willing touch of her flesh, the rich depths of her good laughter, the sounds of her sleep, the lilt of her songs, the sorrow of her weeping. I’ll never see her again but her eyes and the gentle dazzle of her furtive smile are immortal in the coffers of my heart and libido. I did not wantonly crave her. My motives were as pure and honest as involuntary chemistry and soulful compassion.

I just felt a vast longing to help her.

I don’t recall what I said that made her laugh. But she gave me a flash of smile and a quickly suppressed spill of giggle. She covered her mouth with her hand and glanced guiltily at the corpulent matron who roosted behind the front counter of the restaurant feigning friendly smiles and shrilly spitting orders at the peons who were damned to her service.

My lovely waitress cowered at the paint-peeling banter between the fat lady at the register and her sister, an equally rotund harpy stationed back at the food window spurring the cooks and the wait staff with disdain and insult.

So damned loud and harsh and cold were the proprietors of the tablecloth and doily, double-forked and teatime-proper eatery. But then, in dulcet dialect transcending cacophony, she spoke to me.

And, as the mountain child said, “Would y’all care for coffee, sir?” I sensed her life’s story. There was a ring on her left hand. There was a gentle, abiding patience about her and an enduring sense of peace and strength in her graceful movements. She was at once plain and sensuous. And she had the gift of listening eyes and there was a hint, a secret of a lust-lovely smile just beyond a thin veil of fear and decency. How I hated that she cowered.

A few years earlier I had written a sad poem about a waitress in an all-night diner. (It’s in my book, Adventures in the High Wind.)

from Night Diner
(the all-night Waffle House)

Last night I visited a graveyard.
Out on the old highway--
settled in the clutter of ancient tourist courts,
cluttered garages, junk yards,
and poor people--
there was a place of death.

I believe her name was Karen.
Her face was neon cool,
and her eyes were some bitter, scarring secret.
Her young face was drawn rigid
by the frowning message of her lips.
"Would you care for a cup of coffee, sir?"
I looked at her, and no light shown upon me.

Such was the stark vacancy of her soul
that my mind cried out, "No! I don't need your coffee.
I need your smile.
I need to know your flowing breath, your pulsing heart--
some laughing evidence of a life alive within the
night-veiled realm of your spirit."

My voice said, "Yes. Black please."

And as she filled my cup,
as she leaned close across the table
and for an instant glanced and met my gaze,
I saw the soul-sad truth of her being before me.
In the midnight clock,
in the stagger of drunks descending,
in the clutching of one more cup
against the loneliness of the night,
(there was the rattle of saucers and the sizzle of the grill),
in the cycling of hash browns and water glasses
across the tabletops--
yes, I'm sure that "Karen" was the name pinned to her blouse-- I saw the dreadful eyes of death.
I was drinking coffee in a graveyard of dreams.
The night paraded failure
and Karen was its child-tragic queen--
the coroneted essence of its hopeless truth.

It was my second refill
and I had realized her beauty.
There was grace in her movements.
Her uniform swelled
with the sensuous promise of her youth.
Her lips would have been soft in a smile.
"Karen" can be such a pretty name.
"Karen!" came the cry from the grill-lady
as artful eggs in unbroken motions
flowed from their shells.
"Order up!"

* * * *

It was a graveyard of dreams and like some thread-raveled, patchwork quilt I pulled my thin dreams about me,
and, yet, I felt the chill.
Her name was Karen and she was death.
And, with a crumpled dollar hastily drawn
from the pocket of my jeans,
I cast a flower upon her grave,
and fled.

There was no name tag upon the bosom of my Tennessee girl—this fragile lass with self under siege. I couldn’t let her be lost like her all-night sister of the night diner.

But she was meek before the scathing glare of her wardens at the Gatlinburg restaurant in which her spirit was incarcerated.

This beautiful woman needed a poem and, by God, I was a poet. She didn’t need a lover, a teacher, or even a friend. I was sure in other, more kind quarters of her complex existence she knew and gave an abundance of love.

But in that afternoon of noise and bustle and disrespect, she needed a poem to save her from despair.

My wife Carol says, rather than being world renowned for my words, it may be my fine destiny to discover souls in need and selflessly, anonymously tend to them and move on.

Maybe.

That’s what I did back in Tennessee that autumn afternoon. There and in diverse venues of human interaction about the country I have left unsigned deposits of my words.

Maybe that’s what this is all about, this art of mine. We’ll see. So, I wrote her a short poem and left it on the table with a good tip, making sure to escape before she had time to discover my gift. I don’t recall the exact words I wrote but the gist of my message was that in the blaring harshness of the restaurant I had glimpsed her quiet beauty. I told her, regardless of the insult of her employment, somewhere beyond the mouthy fools and fussy customers I knew there were people who were truly blessed to know her embrace, her love, her grace and humor. And I told her my life was richer for its brief, cup-of-coffee-and-sandwich encounter with her loveliness. That’s it. Just the truth and I was gone.

It is an honest story, a pattern of perceived need and anonymous art I’ve often repeated across this land, only different in this version in that I didn’t make a clean getaway.

I was trapped by the snarl of leaf-seekers parading past and sat in my car at the edge of the parking lot. Just as a break in the traffic was about to open up, I saw her come rushing out the backdoor of the restaurant. She stopped a few steps away. I could see the tears upon her face. She held the poem to her heart and said, “Thank you.”

I waved—there were tears in my eyes too—and drove away forever.