BARTENDERS // BARISTAS

Originally published in The Junebug Journal

the keepers of the city,
in their hands 
they hold 
the power to caffeinate,
to seduce,
to enlighten.

they bring respite
to lonely days, 
making it okay to sit alone.
the perfect shot of espresso,
precise measurements,
a thimble of cointreau,
an orange peel,
fingered alongside
a delicate piece of stemware. 

a rush of comfort,
knowing my cortado 
will be waiting for me
when I open the door.
“one shot or two?”
I hesitate,
gauging how much I’ll need
to get through the day.

in the past few months,
my barista has morphed into 
pouring cold brew
from a glass jug
in my fridge.

once weekly,
I savor the few moments 
I get of human interaction.
I stumble over my words,
I interrupt,
too excited for 
basic conversation manners.
when we get to-go cocktails,
a mainstay in nyc’s “after”,
we fuss over how to take a sip
while keeping our masks on.
my tolerance is lower now,
my recovery, slower.

it’s weird to me 
how quickly
“to stay or to go?” 
has left our vernacular.
even sitting outside 
feels foreign—like such a luxury.

do baristas miss us as much 
as we miss them?
do bartenders? 
do they feel the endorphins flowing
every time they see a regular?

I often wonder
how they spend their days now,
how they persevere
when a job that always 
seemed certain, secure
became, in some ways,
impossible,
unreliable,
and risky.

how do they grapple with that?

a city that so desperately needs them--
what do they need?