A Morning In North Beach, San Francisco Poem by Max Reif

Made it to Cafe Trieste, nice walk
through a downtown where everyone seemed to be
'preparing a face for work', till I got here to North Beach-

only place in the world where Italy borders China.
Had to run over to China to buy a pen,
the storekeepers in Italy weren't up yet.

So I've been here an hour and a half,
pleasant atmosphere, not too crowded, really a nice,
Italian, or Italian/beatnik, feeling. Civility.

A guy came up to me, first asked if I need
any problems solved, I said I couldn't think of any,
then he asked if I might support the arts,
and showed me several booklets of his poems.

Rather than reply with, 'BUT I'M GOING TO WRITE
A POEM MYSELF IN A MOMENT! ',
I just asked his prices, and bought the $5 book
rather than a $10 one. Turned out to be
'duets', poems he wrote quickly with friends or passersby,
not satisfying to read, so far.

I asked him if he'd autograph the book.
He brought it back to me a little later with his name
and 'Solve any problem, $20 an hour! ' 'Genius idea, $1,000.'

'Hey, wait, I wanted an autograph, not an ad! '

But he seemed so crestfallen, about to fall over like a stout
tower of Pisa. I patted him on the back.
'It's ok, don't worry, you did autograph it, it's fine.'

That's what I like about this place.