Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

Seated alone on the couch, weary from the day’s labor,
full of hard drink and a heavy meal, he was content this
birthday affair may pass without incident.

A bottle of twenty-five-year Scotch adorned his lap.
He made certain she saw him swallow the sleeping pill she
insisted he withhold until after the party.

He told her he did not want a party, yet she persisted
on account of the supermoon conjoining with Venus
and Mercury being no longer in retrograde.

Nonsense, he muttered, as a tranquil haze washed over him.
The band was warming up out back and guests were arriving
when the initial assault was launched.

Her advance was clumsy and ill-planned.
He stirred upon approach, stiff-arming her to the ground.
A subsequent attempt succeeded with a flanking maneuver

that sent his bottle to the hardwood floor.
“Don’t break that bottle,” she shouted. “That’s my favorite bottle!”
He swept her shins and they tumbled about the room,

laughing and cursing each other. They tumbled into some guests,
spilling their drinks. The guests did not approve.
She retreated to the kitchen. He meandered into the yard

with a fresh glass of whiskey. “Thanks for coming,” he said to
the new arrivals, then stretched onto the cool lawn grass
and gazed upward to the heavens.

He spied the constellation Taurus in the north sky,
invited a blessing of good health and a sign of his longevity.
He awaited the sign as the whiskey-sleeping-pill cocktail took hold.

His eyes grew heavy as coins when a shout was heard
from the house: “Don’t break that glass! That’s my favorite glass!”.
Taurus leapt to his feet and smashed the glass against the sidewalk.

An anxious silence befell the partygoers as Libra emerged
onto the patio. She declared she would bust his head,
then pounced like a wildcat, kicking and clawing at him.

She bit his ear. He yanked her hair. She pushed him into the dirt,
him pulling her down and working her into a chokehold
until she relented.

Taurus relaxed his grip, and they sank into the earth gasping for air.
A passerby stopped to inquire if there was a fight.
“It’s hard to tell sometimes,” he heard someone say.

She heard it too, then climbed atop him, cheerful and triumphant,
glowing like a banshee in the April moonlight.
“You obstinate son of a bitch,” she exhaled, then collapsed in a heap.

And he held her awhile like that, until the cicadas quieted their
evening symphony, the earth rotated eastward to Gemini,
and their breathing fell once again into synchronous rhythm.

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