Pagosa Springs Artists

The Party

 

Beaten down by her infidelity
and the divorce, all he wanted
was to leave town. Needed
a new lease on life, happy space

where eardrums and floorboards
shake, rock-and-roll thumping out
all conversation except the loudest
shouts or peals of laughter, a beat
outpacing his pulse, covering old
heartache with forced gaiety.

A youngish crowd packs this Friday
night into his chic condo, thoughtful
high style of his loft lost in throbbing
human density. Bottles of imported
brew tip to lip, the empties and half-
crocked stacked on every level surface,
little black dresses and leather jackets
losing mutual comparison in the soon
inebriated throng.

Then someone bellows a few loud
musical notes and a wavering song
takes hold, the revelers coming to
focus with unanimity on singing
happy birthday to their host, switch
the evening’s body clock from rock
to a melancholy, communal
auld lang syne.

 

 

first published in Time of Singing

©2013 Bonnie Manion

   

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