I am enjoying this party

The perfect panoply
Perfume and personality
Casual yet clean
The right display of food
The right dosage of wine
The deep toke
A drag or two – what the heck – three!

For the first time in recent memory, I’m attending an event buzzing, content, finally alive
The conversation is easy but real
It confronts one with momentary pause, open wonder
Before tripping easily into warm laughter and a wash of well being

It’s a gentle eureka, this paradise party
Existing, it appears, in immortal splendor

Till now

Yeah – yep – knew it – I fucking knew it! – there it is
Again, the dreaded vibration
The rusted cheese grater of your voice seeping through the thick walls and dense haze of music and connection
The stale garlic of your essence invading my membranes
Drowning me in renewed disgust

Your body enters the room
Again, I find – again!- Fuck! – again? –
Yes, I’m confronted with my own empty inadequacy
My ugly pettiness and low thinking
My fraudulent membership in the tribe
Made ever more clear by this appearance at the door:
You!

Eden has fallen

Now all the warmth flows your way, the loudest honoree I could imagine
(And noisome too!)

I just don’t see it
But they do
Perhaps, were I they, I would too
But I am not they
And they – no! – Goddamnit! – they do not
They take no notice as I fade into the wall
Unseen, forgotten
Whatever happened to…

And so now the night returns us to our status quo:
Another party ruined
Another annihilation of innocent vulnerable dreams
Another pint of premium vanilla vanishing
The sad white man awash in another stale white man’s sour monologue glowing blue from the oversized plastic miracle flowing with electrons and Internet

Comfort – diabetes – dull, dull, yet certain
Rot
And pain

Thanks. Thanks a lot – asshole.

His scowl sets hearts aflutter, unwinds our shell of self-control
Fueling fantasies he could be our lover, our leader
A lion among men

Oh dear he smiles
And the dreams unwind and reveal how common
How unsubstantial he truly is

So we move on, seeking to worship others equally unworthy
But better marketers
Who know at least to hide the upturn of their mouths.

He’s the kind of guy whose stories always begin boldly, so auspiciously seductive.
Oh my god this is going to be so I don’t know what’s the word? Great? Yes so great…
And…and then?

And then
The narrative unwinds in vague mumbles that leave you deflated and bored
Ruing your wasted time

We want so badly to love him
And in the end underneath it all we do
But he doesn’t stick in our minds with the passion our hopes had dreamed for him

A disappointing soap opera star met at the grocery check-out
Bags of organic candy
The lonely generic dandruff shampoo

It’s a shame and we shake our heads at the unnerving tragedy
How come some people just can’t get their shit together and live up to what we expect in them?
Shame shame shame shake shake shake

Hello, mirror, good morning.