Her self-defense, lurking on outskirts that juxtapose
shadows and light, she rehearses a performance
of tense drama written in the purple-prose
she must compose during daylight diffidence.

As twilight deepens so does her confidence
and hence, her metamorphosis to socialite
with the night. Her blue-black sheen of elegance
holds in sultry suspense a fly-by-night
male in yellow stripes. The preening popinjay
is her prey for the evening. Lush and overripe
against the drainpipe, she begins the play-by-play.
Hourglass figure gay in red, a geisha guttersnipe.

She plays coquette, naughty nurse, cheeky chambermaid;
each charade spurs him to take her, locking silhouettes.
He whets her hunger; she bites off his head. Masquerade
over, the self-made widow weaves silk from spinnerets.



� 2001 by PJ Nights
previously published in The Emerald Collection