Poems in this issue Linda Barrett Ruth Deming Jan Felgoise Marion Fox Angela Glover Jan Goldman Maxine Hobbs Grace Lynch Marvin Thall   Edited by Kristine Grow For more information about  writing workshops offered by the Cheltenham Township Adult School, contact: Cheltenham Township Adult School 1414 Panther Road Wyncote, PA 19095 Phone: 215-887-1720	Linda Barrett Coffee she has many names, java, joe or just simply joe. She comes from many places: Hawaii, Rwanda, Columbia, Mexico but she’s still the same thing. Coffee. She awakens you every morning with her hard, bitter taste-black and bold in her natural form-just before she puts on her sweet and creamy make up. She bites back just as you kiss her in the morning. Greets the morning in her basic black just before she puts on her make up to make you face the day. Try to sweeten her with sugar and cream. Or take her black with her grainy, gravel voiced taste to make you face the hard bold reality of the morning. That’s Coffee. She can be found everywhere. She claims she’s been born everywhere: Rwanda, Hawaii, Columbia, and other places you can’t pronounce and don’t know about if you could find them on the world map. She goes around from place to place seen everywhere and you can’t get away from her. Because you need her to keep you going today. She wakes you up every day by smelling her. She gives off her bitter, dark taste as you first sip her in the morning. By adding cream and sugar you mellow her acrid personality. Her bitter, hot kiss jolts you awake to smell her rich, deep odorous perfume. That’s coffee for you. Hot and dark. She tells you she’s from everywhere: she says she’s from Colombia, Hawaii, Sumatra, and all over. She changes her personality and dialect like a professional actress to do her work for you. She tells you she came from Colombia from a mountain side village taken by peasants. Miss Coffee She’s the friend who uses rough tactics to get you up in the morning. She uses her bruskness to get you to work on time. In the morning, she greets you, black and gravelly voiced in her bad mood morning. You take one sip from her and she bites you into the morning’s reality. Opening your eyes to face what’s out there. You welcome her to keep you awake on your morning commute. She’s the friend who punches you in the face for your own good. She’s a social drink. You have her around for any occasion. She makes you share in other company. You have to put some sugar in her and pour the cream in her to make her more pleasant. She’ll tell you of all the places she’s been born in. She’ll tell you she’s been born in Columbia in a mountain side village. She has so many nations within her genetic pool. She changes her accent and personality to suit herself but she’s still the brusque, tough talking friend who does her roughness for your own good. She makes you work hard throughout the day. She gives you a good hard caffeine slap in the face to make you wake up and smell her bitter, strong odor. She makes you take charge of your life and gets you going until you get home. She’ll wear latte, espresso, cappuchino, she changes her clothes to make herself look better when she encounters you. She makes herself presentable in many flavors. Pour sugary syrups in her and she becomes a much sweeter drink. You have to dress her up to make you face her. As espresso, she is tough and strong right cross in the face strong at your first sip. She dances heartburn dances within the center of your digestive tract. She comes in minus any tact. That’s how she is. That’s Coffee. She has many names: Java, Decaf, names of coffee but she’ll always be plain old Joe. That’s her. That’s Coffee. Her kiss awakens you every morning to the day’s reality. That’s Coffee. Her dark face is the first thing that you see. That’s Coffee! She tastes bitter at the first sip. That’s Coffee! You taste the power of her caffeine. She’s trying to be nice to you by being so mean. That’s her! That’s Coffee! She’ll be the center of every crowd! That’s her! That’s Coffee! She wakes up!                                      A Gathering Of Poets   They all come together for the moment, Open the briefcases of their lives Produce experiences from their minds, Transformed onto all sorts of paper and words As safer evidences of their insanity. They do it in the manner Of an old Elementary School Show and Tell, Read slowly and politely To keep their raging spirits in control In their stiff ,school room etiquette. After staring at each other for two hours, They stop their calm voiced ravings Civilly shake hands and compliment each other Suitcase up their black and white neuroses Straight-jacket themselves in the black cloaked night Drawing back into nautilus fashion into their own asylums Until they return to bare their tamed delusions out again.	"Storytelling reveals meaning without committing the error of defining it." Hannah Arendt
	Editor's note:   At this time, The Tookany Review is accepting only the work of writers who are enrolled or have been enrolled in Cheltenham Adult School writing workshops. Home

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