Pretty girls holding plastic cups

Pretty girls holding plastic cups,
foam tipping from the top.
Sliding through shoulders,
finding doors to close behind us.

Love lusts for validation and lust
loves holding lucky hands,
awkward gropes, a stupor one
can only find when one
sees blood floating in a syringe.

We've come to the conclusion
that we're not good at this at all.
Well let's not be not good together
anymore, contrary to how
we want to want.

Single-file line to the bathroom,
mirrors point out the obvious
and pep talks are disconcerting
like snake-oil salesmen that
target marks with precision.

Draining the lizard.

There are so many things to
talk about, but the ones we
care to discuss seem to be the ones
that topple the see-saw. They
are the ones that are the

cause of broken limbs. Everybody
dance. We're dancing, no rhythm
but the ones we keep in our heads.
No song but the footsteps mistaken
for missteps and the gradual

build-up to what can be mistaken
as what we are mistaking for
key moments in the context of
an evening that pretty much
is begging for deception.

As if nobility simply meant
taking one for the team
and valor was just doing
the right thing, defining deviancy
down and when ants fill holes into

sugar bowls and when
destiny is just another word
for hope, I will keep you in
mind when I keep in mind

that all I wanted was to
keep this see-saw steady
by not participating in this game.