Outline of a Plastic Night

Soft skin, marred,

jagged cheekbones

cutting into blank white;

suffocating plastic sweats

against the mouth of the thing.

A moth-swarm of faces,

of sickly hospital white

plastic; mouths gasping

for air and everyone drinking spirits

like the world is about to end.

The façade of a masquerade,

pearl whites with jagged oysters

creaking underneath, all botox

and sloppily revisited youth;

death is passed as a disease.

One within, too prideful

for a mask, yet pale faced

enough to spend the night

in the quagmire and relive

the quicksand underfoot forever.

Hard, wrinkled women

ruining themselves,

asphyxiating slowly in the crushing

pressure of plastic on sweat on skin

right down to the bone.

Still, the white-wind, bare, ghost

lingers in the after-party,

picking up the discarded masks

with smooth, youthful fingers;

resignedly exhaling down into sinking earth.

2017-2018