(Berkeley, 1972)

Pass the students, the panhandlers, the waiting
dogs, the cotton-robed Krishna-chanting girl
hawking poems. Have a drink, contemplating
the scene, and the state of the world.

How for no cause the war goes on burning
the best we could be, while the sad
simple fact for the rest is discerning
that growing up means knowing you’ve been had.

Climb the stairs to your right. Head straight back for
the restroom, but be sure to allow
a moment to read what’s been written
inside on the ladies’ room door:
I wish I could be what I was when
I wanted to be what I am now.
 
 
Wendy Sloan practiced labor law with the firm of Hall & Sloan before returning to poetry. Sunday Mornings at the Caffe Mediterraneum (Kelsay Books, 2016) is her first collection. Sloan’s poems and Italian translations have appeared in journals including The Able Muse, Big City Lit, Blue Unicorn, Measure, Mezzo Cammin, The Raintown Review, Think and Umbrella, among other publications, and in the anthologies The Best of the Raintown Review, The Great American Wise Ass Poetry Anthology, and Poems for a Liminal Age, benefiting Medecins Sans Frontieres, UK. She has been a finalist in the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award Competition and was twice nominated for a Pushcart Prize.