cockles flame open.
'How long on the chicken?'
The chef stands at the door
performing final checks,
an author, copy-editing the text,
while out front, a father and son take their place.
He's young, fragile, pale,
hair neatly parted as a book open at the centre page.
His father takes a water
his son, a flute of champagne,
one stream of bubbles threading its core,
delicate and finely strung as their conversation.
So, what's the story here?
No one can know for sure,
except that there will be one.
A young chef, got his first job?
In another brief, one-lined stanza, Sheers asks the question the reader is also asking.
Service