NIGHTLIFE

She sits on a table at the far end of the bar,

legs crossed,

her feline eyes—passively sympathetic—pouring into mine,

while the fuse between her fingertips expires.

Only she finds me,

me, the animal trapped on the other side of the divide,

awaiting slaughter

While they avoid my eyes.

They with their cocktails and coffees

            the bear with a tigress in his lap

(he, protecting? or she, shielding?)

the monkey in the middle

impassioned in a terror that never presses too close

the boorish man,

watching my passing as if it were a 30-second ad

the long-faced lady in the red gown

Banished from the ball for pulling her own carriage

the sexy snake seducing her mirror,

Yes, the whore,

the horrified, the perverted

all watching something I cannot see

except she

in the green

at the end,

helpless,

yet watching me

in the end.