Thousand: Six Hundred Ninety-Seven

looks about on the ground. The girl holds up a cane, and the woman takes it, nods. She begins to walk away. The girl assails the cup in what she sees as a last attempt to conclude its emptiness. The coffee in her mouth seems ever more formidable, swallowing it requiring a jaw that detaches at the hinge, that is if this ancient liquid would give itself to the body like a dead god still lighting cups. It’s not that it’s large but that it’s feisty. Ferocious. And when it allows a bit of its power to wander into her,