Caffeine-induced Hallucination

A caffeine induced hallucination, that must be it.
Three hours of surveying the swirling patterns
on the wooden table, and I finally spot the eye.

It’s taken five cups of coffee, drunk in sips once
it has cooled down and grown tasteless,
but now it burns a hole through me like it's a lit cigarette.

It’s been watching me the whole time, and surely
I’ve traced my finger over it a hundred
times without feeling it's gaze.

Now that it's empty, there is no longer the quiet hum
of people to distract me and the
chandelier overhead is rocking as though

the ghost of a vulture-eyed man-perhaps
it is his eye on the table- is pushing
it, in rhythm with the pounding of my heart

Coffee shops are ghost towns at five a.m.
All that’s awake now is me and the gray skies,
and the eye that’s been watching me sip cold coffee

hour after hour, and I wonder why
I haven't noticed it the other days that I've been here,
or if perhaps it only just appeared...