At the Café

Cusco, Peru

by Suzanne Roberts

I order another glass of red wine,
though it comes from a leather bag,
tastes terrible. No one will ask,
Don’t you think you’re drinking too much?
Then try a café or coca leaf tea, another
piece of dry lemon cake. Eat it
in the dim, dirty light. Stay
up all night, walk the streets
with the children selling postcards.
No one knowing where I am—
the certain freedom that comes only
with loneliness. The margin between
wanting everything, and wanting
nothing, growing fainter and fainter.