*

Poet Jason Youngclaus writes: “When I returned to the Boston area after living in NYC for 15 years, I moved into the heart of East Somerville. As you do when you move into an area, you look for ‘spots’ that become routine. One morning, I was walking along Washington Street, hungry, and I spied this tiny lunch-car diner. I went in and immediately felt at home.  I ended up frequenting the joint and getting to know the regulars, the people that worked there, and as a result, started learning about the history of the diner as an establishment once named Buddy’s Truck Stop. But then, suddenly, Buddy’s had to close because of dire plumbing issues.

Poet Jason Youngclaus

Fast forward a bit: On a whim back in November of last year, I started writing this verse novella (I’m not sure what else you’d call it), remembering my time there and imagining what the place would have been like back in the day. Lo and behold, as I was writing this thing, Buddy’s owner has been launching a campaign to reopen the diner. And just this month, there is a column in the Boston Globe about her campaign securing grants from the city and god knows what else.”

Jason Youngclaus is the author of the poetry collection Little Planet Raisins (Spartan Press, 2020). His work has appeared in Cathexis Northwest Press, Transcendent Zero Press, and From Whispers to Roars, among others, and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize.

At the Counter at Buddy’s: Movement 1

“Walking through the sliding door into the middle of any 1920s diner, the customer was struck instantly by the long marble counter. By now, all diners were configured with the counter running the length of the car”

— Richard G.S. Gutman, American Diner: Then and Now

Cláudio sits at the counter at Buddy’s,
he’s got one of those barely black eyes
that border between
fresh from too many hours
and spoiled from too many spills
off the supermoto.
He orders a single pancake with only butter,
“One wrong turn and you’re dead,”
he utters, leaning forward into
the 200 mph turns round the track at
the Loudon Classic in Laconia.
Served a black coffee,
he sips it like a singer concluding a ballad
that could tear your heart out.

When José whips his pancake plate to 3:00 down the counter,
there are 3 unmistakable seconds
where the air smells like cooling rubber.
As that dissipates,
coffee reassumes its watch.
The place is now three quarters full,
which makes you wonder
who will fill it in
before José, who comes in and out
of conversations,
puts on one of his many symphonies of
greasebelt perfection
from behind the grill:
a Denver omelet well done to Manuel,
a spatula scrape and a flip—
fluffy pancakes to the family in the back,
French toast to Emily,
the way only she takes it,
a veggie omelet with avocado for me,
3 burgers cooked 3 different ways
for 3 hungover kids from BC,
questions from a masked Yelp couple out of Jersey—
you cash only, you got an ATM?—
A Buddy’s special for Bruce—
hot on a plate and crackling,
a bacon-fueled cacophonous hum.
A fresh batch of homefries for everyone,
and maybe a trumpet solo,
or a string section
to provide a clinical counterpoint that,
like the hum of traffic to a hungry dog—
I feel before hearing.

— Jason Youngclaus

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