The History of Poetry: Sarah the Waitress' Poem

I was touched to see you smile
when I gave you a piece of myself.
I didn't have to beg you and
you even offered to pay.

We have always been beggars
since the troubadours
gathered crowds at the corners
of deprived broken villages
owned by peasants, and implored
all to come and listen to the songs.
The audience was always innocent.

The audience would come
if they had nothing else to do.
The singers would fill up the empty hours
and sometimes a few coins would flow.
We lived between the towns,
in wooden carts drawn by starving horses.
We had no place to go
and nothing to do but watch.