Just before the employees walked out,
I visit the Starbucks Reserve a few blocks
up from the hotel for my, now regular,
late morning espresso martini

and to watch the parade of influencers
posing out front, always in pairs.
There’s the face of the operation
trying to make limbs long and casual

and the heel holding the camera, 
the bag, and sometimes a lighting setup
while trying to catch the eye
and hold the traffic. 

Both of them, like wrestlers working
in the crowd, stomp on the little 
planters, incidentally
not accidentally.

The next bout of the morning starts
with the heel in the doorway twitching
his phone for the time while the face,
a light-skinned Asian woman waits

across the street for the green 
and stands in the building’s shadow
for fear the sun will use up her skin
as if her life is a countdown of days,

hours, minutes, and seconds in the light
while I hope to measure mine 
in livers, pages, and words.

Christian Hanz Lozada’s (he/him) near-accolades include two Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominations, runner up in the table//FEAST Blossom Contest for BIPOC writers, and almost dated Super Bowl halftime star Jessica Alba (if an initiated conversation counts). He wrote the poetry collection He’s a Color, Until He’s Not. His poetry has been published worldwide, including in Bamboo Ridge, Cordite Poetry Review, and Emerson Review. Christian has featured at the Autry Museum and Beyond Baroque. He lives in San Pedro, CA and uses his MFA to teach his neighbors and their kids at Los Angeles Harbor College.