Name your poison

        “Ya right mate?”

“Ummmm, bourbon!”


a bourbon drinker

how original

I make his night

& give him a discount

he makes mine with a 20 cent tip


drunken souls frolic & flop

carousing with an abandon

they clamour & argue

spit spew laugh bitch & bawl

night after night

all night

every night


plastic nails & spastic males

pierced noses & tattoed roses

pretty faces & serious cases

penis extensions/breast implants

enhancement touches & breaks

the delicate balance of cruel façade


paralysis prevents & presides

over the immunity clauses in my

Bar-tender’s Social Contract

so I watch impotent

slave to the bar-flies

        “Screw this!


        I’m goin’ for a cigarette.”

I step into the fire-escape

rather aptly named

after the collection of butts

& quick-release desires

the boom BOOM BOOOOOM

of the music

penetrates even these walls


there is no escape, I muse

as I step back

back into the fire

         "OK, who’s next?”

the meat market is in full swing

Cupid takes aim… & misses

the melee swirls teetering lazy


I am their feeder

the Zoo-keeper

perennial nameless slave


faces ebb & flow

identity pokes & guesses

rising falling away

down

down

creatures of nocturnal calling

toothy for booze & sex


        “Name your poison!”