Old Book Binder’s Restaurant

by Daisy Zamora

For Sandy Taylor

I

I watch the liveliness
in the packed dining room:
everyone is talking, laughing, ordering
exquisite meals and desserts
presented as if wild gardenias, heliotropes,
and carnivorous orchids on silver trays.

The waiters take away plates
piled with leftovers, desserts
barely touched by spoons
briefly tasted then cast aside.
That seems to be natural here.

I drink beer
at my solitary table,
devour fresh oysters from New Jersey
and don’t get it.

II

Four elderly women share a table
and toast each other with faded voices
lifting their trembling glasses.

After the third round of martinis
they are four joking, chattering girls
liberated from their corpses.

III

In Philadelphia is Old Bookbinder’s
and in Old Bookbinder’s am I ,
contemplating
the waste.

—Translated by George Evans