Minutiae - The Poems

Minutiae turns its attention to the quiet theatre of the everyday — the small dramas that unfold without notice on sidewalks, in reflections, and at the edge of the ordinary. This is the city’s poetry: This is the city’s poetry — small, silent offerings, waiting for those who know how to look.

In each frame, the overlooked becomes something more. Humor lives beside melancholy; absurdity beside grace. Together they form a portrait of human persistence — how, even in the smallest details, life insists on being seen.

  • A mannequin sells faceless desire,

    borrowed swagger on legs.

    In a city built to steal your attention, she asks:

    are you still paying attention?

    Style, it turns out, is a conversation with

    whoever wanders by.

  • At the edge of the lane, a small assembly forms:

    coffee in hand, pigeons negotiating, a bus sighing its amen.

    This is a weekday liturgy,

    rituals performed in miniature.

    Communion is simply standing together

    until the light changes.

  • Beneath a spill of bougainvillea,

    two city dwellers cross paths.

    The scene unfolds without ceremony

    a glance, a pause, a step forward.

    For a heartbeat, the ordinary feels like choreography

    a city’s performance when no one’s looking.

  • On a quiet city street, empire and dial tone

    share the same small shrine.

    History promises answers;

    the handset promises options.

    Either way, someone is always on hold.

  • Lined up against a child’s dirty window,

    repeat offenders in the daily disorder.

    Guilty of nothing but being

    exactly where they always are.

    Familiarity is the heart’s alibi.

  • Beauty bar lookout; contained,

    perfect and unblinking.

    Each passerby measured,

    weighed, and found wanting.

    Judgment, it seems, is part of the service.

    The city looks away, distracted by

    its own reflection.

  • Woman in the window; the watcher

    and the watched.

    Her stillness registers: it’s only a

    doll though, or nearly close enough.

    We call it display, not confinement.

    Some of us learn early

    how to hold a pose.

  • They gather at dusk, these

    guardians of night.

    Their creed is simple: to

    shine brightly where darkness fears.

    Every family keeps its own order,

    secrets passed like flame to wick,

    blinding to all within its orbit.