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Someone’s having a party
and there will be cake
(yellow cake with pink frosting)
and there will be pink drinks
served with tiny pink umbrellas
and there will be music and movement
and mad, mad, mad dancing
each thrumming pulse bent
to strike the floor
that is ballroom, backroom
courtyard, club; that is back porch,
back alley, bowling alley, disco
someone’s having a party
and we will write our names
in sparks, christen ourselves
Still-very-much-alive
no room for disapproval
(there will be cake!)
no room for cruelty
(there will be pink drinks!)
and pink swans folded
from pink paper, hung
from the lemon tree leaning
in the corner—a place we find ourselves
before the lights go on.
Someone’s having a party
that stretches on as fingers,
hidden places, slanted light
on unmade beds, as poached eggs
coffee, slice of last night’s cake
that spills from open windows
as fire escape, bougainvillea
pink Chucks dancing
the outlines of our faces
intent to take the sidewalk home
mouths full of this one
forever day.
Note: “You are all invited” first appeared in The Westchester Review (Fall 2023).