At this jacaranda-shaded café, waiters hover,
ready to pounce the moment any glass is empty, any ashtray full.
Solitary watching is permitted, if you’re a tourist,
but only for so long.
Those rich girls from Coyoacan
in their dizzying heels and tight, tight jeans
salsa by across a minefield of gaps and potholes,
the pavement their catwalk. Against probability,
they never fall over.//
As the afternoon lengthens the dog-walkers come out.
Sooty scotties, skewbald spaniels, classy breeds with curly tails
jostle and frolic, tug at their leads, escape,
rush round the plazuela, in and out of the low box hedges;
go hysterical, chased by insurgent children, among
the trees painted white waist-high, the glaucous blades of agave.
The old men, though, forever clustered by the fountain,
smoke and gossip;
the shrieking green parrots on fly-past
through the purpling dusk,
they’ve seen it all before.