enjoying a gentle dinner with a few friends
when I fished something out of my soup bowl
it looked like string or twine, maybe wire
unidentifiable, long, and soup-colored

I tugged on the waiter's sleeve and said
"excuse me mate, but a dingo ate my baby!"
"what did you say?"
"oh, nothing. look, this was in my soup," I said,
holding up the string thing on the end of a fork

"no it wasn't."
"well, sure it was...look, it's all soup-colored and soggy..."
"You could have put that into the soup, how do I know?"
"ask my friend here if I put it in the soup!"
the waiter asked; "did you see that thing come out of his soup?"
to which Bob responded with a shrug
and another mouthful of asparagus
"you see there, no proof. no proof, no free soup!"
the waiter said, as he turned and walked to the kitchen

I tried to give my pal the evil eye
but he never looks away from his food
not even for silent condemnation
so I got up and made my way back to the kitchen

I poked through the double doors
and saw my waiter, the cashier, a couple of cooks
several other waiters, a cop, a circus clown
and a shirtless man in a kilt and flip-flops
playing a vicious game of soccer
using a dozen rolled up bras as a ball
they had fashioned crude goalposts out of dumpster lids
and the boundary lines were drawn with comet cleanser

tropical birds flew about everywhere
yapping and pecking and bouncing off walls
off to the side, above the stoves
a pair of miniature llamas watched from a cage
it was a spirited game, lots of elbows and feet flying
many of the players appeared to be seriously injured

I backed out of the kitchen and went back to the table
"you get that all straightened out?" someone asked
"yeah, yeah," I said, as I picked up my spoon
and finished eating the soup