An Evening with Friends

 

Avenue de Clichy by Louis Anquetin (1887)

                                             

                                                

Night rush.

Faces, food, and frenzied fumbling

Masks half worn 

and half undone. 

Night hush.

An uphill trod

Soles buckling underfeet

Each step lighter till finally set free. 

Night slush.

Word piled upon word

Some rehearsed, some drawn fresh

The poet's and ours. 

Night hush

Again.

And a wide open window

Nestled in the city, a party

Slivers of laughter floating our way.