They linger in a street-corner diner
long after others have retreated
to bed from their industrial jobs.

Two choices:
Work and go home
to sleep and eat the same old food
and turn the news on without volume,
or work and go to the diner
to sit among distant strangers
under bright fluorescent lights.

It is sad that these two seem
to be the only options
in this society of urban emptiness:
go home and feel disconnected
or go to the diner and feel the same way.

In both options, others will accompany you:
either strangers in a diner,
or the strangers you call your family.
But other people don’t matter;
not in this life you are leading.
Work matters.
Money matters.

You go to the diner
to seek refuge
from your monotonous life-
but the clinking dishes
only emphasize
the silent void between you
and everyone else.

This sense of sadness is relentless.
You can’t pinpoint the source,
you can’t understand how to make it leave.
It is painfully obvious-
the reason behind your sadness-
but you are blinded
by diner’s bright fluorescent lights.

They beat down into the faces of the customers,
illuminating worry lines
and grim expressions.
The lights shine down on grease
that has accumulated on the countertops
after a long day of people just like you
bustling in and out of the diner,
always in a hurry,
always seeking the reasonable, fast solution.

The diner is the only establishment
lit up on the entire street,
and the bright fluorescent lights
seep out onto the pavement
in a green glow.

It is eerie, how empty the streets
and industrial buildings
appear during the night.
But what’s even eerier
is how empty they feel
in the morning,
long after the diner’s lights have shut off
and its customers have retreated
back into the darkness of routine.