625 : The Coffee Grinder

Posted from beside a pool in Bali.

The Coffee Grinder

He is old, somewhere over eighty,

Brown, creased and nearly toothless;

Indelible signs of a long life, well lived.

With pride, he showed us his coffee factory,

A wonder of function and innovation.

Filtered through a translator,

He talked of the beans
And their passage through the process.

Of the sorting, the roasting, the sieving and grinding 

That lead to the fine, brown, aromatic powder

Stored in lined, woven bags.

He urged us to smell and we obeyed.

Coffee will never be the same again;

All future cups will be infused with the echo

Of the memories

Of the aroma 

Of the old man

Met in that dark building

In the Balinese jungle.

He also talked,

Through the translator,

Of his love for his wife,

Of his loneliness since she had died.

As we left, I went to shake his hand.

But instead he put his arms around me,
Embraced me warmly

And, with tears in his eyes,

Asked “When will you be coming back”

No translation was necessary.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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