An ice-cube for his whisky,
a matchstick for her gin,
colliding at sin’s before and after.
A cadre within a coterie within
a clique: where malice and restlessness
might meet as lovers, limbs into
smoke-plumes, faces quickly forgotten.
Panting after girls down the hallway
of flung cushions, lifting the skirts of
any half-strange shadow, no strength left
to lasso idols down. Easier to try
the outfit on and make human (noble even)
the enemy seething in his great big oyster-
waders, shell-crushers like a scepter held aloft.
Small wonder that a neglected wife
should pile her hair with loot,
the scale tipping with one too many
an exotic lie. The influence of suitors
ballooned to echo his excess. Nor was
he blind to the sudden sullen profusion
of orange and lilac on her pillow.