Looks Like A Nice Day Poem by Jan Oskar Hansen

Looks like a nice day

When my wife has treatment for her legs, I notice most patients are women
who in their youth had worn high-heeled shoes; but what do I know
it could have been childbearing, weakening the bones.
I sit outside a small café; the weather has gone from overcast to mild sun.
Four workers enter; three of them are black, painting the house
for a man who looks Irish but isn't, he is middle-aged and has curly grey hair
and drinks a pint of ale while painters in sudden sobriety drink water
they eat a stew of meat and beans
On another table sits a tall black man, I think he is a poet, If my old friend
Jimmy, who has been sober for 30 years, would have said the tall man
was an alcoholic drinking wine so early.
It was a nightmare going to a restaurant with Jimmy, scanned tables
and if anyone had more than two beers, he said they were alcoholics,
I didn't dare drink in his presence.
Sometimes, Jimmy went on my nerves, was hectic and got irritated
when things didn't go his way also smoked like a chimney
This working-class neighbourhood is blessed, a place peaceful,
free of racism and the dreaded BLM.