In The Proletarian Restaurant Poem by Bill Grace

In the proletarian Restaurant
there is no paper on which to write
only the distant red head
whose youth more than beauty
calls to an observer.

I wonder about the fast food worker
who was here for so many years,
has been gone at least two years,
time flying ever more quickly -
it may be three or even four
that he is gone.

I wonder about the postal worker
even at fifteen yards
you could smell the salesman about him
he will never be a victim
of the bean counters.

Yes I am a fool,
would be starving
under the standard formulas,
had Ruth not rescued me
on her death bed.
All of this in the restaurant
where I saw 911 unfold
and trembled for our civil liberties,
while in its parking lot
the man with the enormous pickup truck
has "IRON CROSS"
cut deep through the front fender.