With exacting zeal, Tommy mimics
a serious man drinking a café con
leche at an Upper West Side bar.
Unshaven, wearing a jaunty French
cap, energized and spontaneous
he scribbles tiny indecipherable
notes and diagrams with black ink.
Shimmering clusters of circles
and dots connect an infinite number
of thin lines far off in the distance
signifying perhaps, multiple versions
of a future he expects to take place.
Widely considered a genius by all,
with his quiet strength of keen focus
and concentration until he’s accused
of being an extraterrestrial and cast

off the earth still wearing his beret.

Jill G. Hall

Published in San Diego Poetry Annual 2019 – 2020