A woman sits in a coffee shop with a green matcha drink, topped with a heart made of foam. The barista calls it "a sad, little, wrinkly heart," but the speaker admires it anyway and keeps watching it hold together as she drinks. Left behind on the glass is a ring of tiny bubbles, which she imagines as a seashore with the tide going out.
Then the poem widens. Smoke from distant forest fires drifts in and dims the morning light, and the air stings eyes and noses. The speaker notes, quietly, that what burns was recently trees. In the last lines she makes a wish: let the heart float until everyone reaches "the far side of every fire."
The mood is gentle but uneasy. Small, ordinary pleasure sits beside a larger worry, and the fragile foam heart comes to stand for hope, tender and imperfect, that she hopes can last through hard times.