Post Workshop Treat

I like to go to a cafe to read, relax, write, think, after my workshop and today, coincidentally while enjoying this lovely pear and vanilla madeleine (glute-free to boot) - I ended getting a bit of clarity and writing far more than I expected..

Proust’s Madeleine
by Kenneth Rexroth

Somebody has given my 
Baby daughter a box of 
Old poker chips to play with.   
Today she hands me one while   
I am sitting with my tired   
Brain at my desk. It is red.   
On it is a picture of 
An elk’s head and the letters   
B.P.O.E.—a chip from 
A small town Elks’ Club. I flip   
It idly in the air and 
Catch it and do a coin trick   
To amuse my little girl. 
Suddenly everything slips aside.   
I see my father 
Doing the very same thing,   
Whistling “Beautiful Dreamer,”   
His breath smelling richly 
Of whiskey and cigars. I can   
Hear him coming home drunk   
From the Elks’ Club in Elkhart   
Indiana, bumping the 
Chairs in the dark. I can see   
Him dying of cirrhosis 
Of the liver and stomach 
Ulcers and pneumonia, 
Or, as he said on his deathbed, of   
Crooked cards and straight whiskey,   
Slow horses and fast women.