Courtesy of Flickr/Sam Klein.
in a café I watch a boy
maybe five years old
hit his sister again and again
till his mom gives him a phone
on which to watch videos of boys
shooting Nerf guns and when the waitress
approaches he looks up at her
and says You’re beautiful
and then looks toward his mother and says
That was polite and the two women
make approving noises and give him
waffles and he begins to lick the syrup
from the plate with his tongue