They Are Human After All

They are human after all, you think, as the waiter steps up to a table out of sight of you, reserved, corner table— they too are thin-skinned and pleasure-seeking, with their own feelings and their own sufferings. You’re not so all alone in your mess, your restlessness, your shakes, they too will be full of doubt, dither, shilly-shallying, even if it’s all about making deals, the universal-human albeit in its commercial manifestations, but present there too. Truly, the grief of hearts is ubiquitous and unending, but whether they were ever in love (outwith the awful wedded bed) burning, athirst, desert-parched for the nectar of a faraway mouth, sinking, drowning in the impossibility of a union of souls— you won’t know, nor can you ask the waiter, who’s just ringing up another bock, always avid for coupons to quench a thirst of another nature, though also deep.