LA ÑAPA

In Dominican Spanish la ñapa refers to "the little extra" added on at the end. Just when you thought you'd gotten all that you would get, along comes your ñapa, like a baker's dozen, with one more kiss, one more pastelito, one more mango at the mercado.

for Chucha

A few months ago, my husband Bill tore out an announcement out from his ROAST MAGAZINE. The magazine was sponsoring its 2nd Annual Davis Demitasse Poetry Contest. "You should submit something," Bill suggested. I pointed out that the poems had to be "about coffee in one form or another." I didn't have a poem about coffee, and furthermore, I didn't write poems to order. My husband put the announcement in my basket of stuff out in the hall and every time I went downstairs, there it was, staring in me in the face.

Then, one morning, I thought, why don't I try this out. I had such a vivid memory from childhood of old Chucha reading the future from the stains left in coffee cups, a tradition in the Dominican Republic. Soon I was deep inside the poem. I could smell the beans. I could see that old woman so clearly, her lined face, her wise eyes, old Chucha who had been dead for a decade, who had read my coffee cup and predicted a future I couldn't remember.

I sent my poem in, and it won second prize! So, I'm passing on my husband's suggestion to all you poets out there: why not write a poem about coffee and submit it to the annual Davis Demitasse Poetry Contest? Maybe you'll win first prize? And even if you don't win, you'll still have a new poem to read to yourself while you sip, why not? Café Alta Gracia! Besides every entry gets a bright orange T-shirt that is guaranteed to wake you up, coffee or no coffee!

Here's my poem. Read the other winning poems at freeroaster.com.

Reading the Coffee Cup