St. Marks

How many dead poets does it take to build a real coffee shop? To spin Belle and Sebastian records past one, entertaining the crash actors and artists that wander in from the fattened veins of the flatlining suburbs? The city has a pulse, quieter than the oscillating plastic fanblades, but alive and hiding in the sighing walls encasing this liberal locker. The Tuesday clientele. The European hats. There are enough cigarettes lit at all times to conjure up the ghosts of Sal Paradise, leaning against the ground-up counter and slouching over the typewriter, recalling hot whiskey nights and reenacting them with drafty, callous hands. The cigarettes fold into themselves, surrendering to styrofoam ash-catchers, fuel for Philosophy minors and big hair. I want to eat off the table in a joint like this. I want to taste coffee stains from the earliest eighties, and the sweet, cold residues of Denver.