Durkheim at the Budapest Cafe

 I wrote this many years ago as a gift to my father when he retired.  (I eventually went back to the Budapest Cafe.  The service and the food were both terrible.)  

        DURKHEIM AT THE BUDAPEST CAFE 

                          (for my father)

                                     by

                           Nina Kallen                                                  

 

The CSA met at the round table
Of the Budapest Café.

The prices were outrageous.

The waiters were snotty.

I accompanied you underdressed,

And squirmed in the greatest elegance I had ever seen.

"Ask her why! Ask her why!"

You insisted your colleagues inquire 

Why my father's daughter

Was majoring in sociology.    

Like a deer caught in headlights,  

I searched for the soundbite 

That would explain my life to date.   

"She read Durkheim," 

You filled in for me. 

Everyone understood everything.

Everyone laughed appreciatively.  

That was half my life ago.  

I passed through loving Durkheim, 

Ambled through scoffing at him,  

Came to annually dusting off the top of Suicide 

On the second to the bottom shelf.  

That night was our fulcrum, 

Two lives momentarily balanced,

In the sways of ups and downs,  

In the love of a dead Frenchman, 

In words that explain everything and nothing  

To everyone, 

And to each other.