Yet another ghost leaks from a pussy and passes me by.
            Hardly a glance in my direction, scarcely a thank you.
 

A swing slips down from the ceiling, the ghost mounts
             and sways over its mother’s heaving form, its toes
 

dipping in the warm ripples of her wet,
             the same wet that nearly drowned me.
 

To be clear, it’s a shame I didn’t drown.
             Tonight, only one ghost will glitter this room.
 

I remain the gentleman in the top hat,
              kneeling to help the starlet descend from her high.
 

This moment is not my moment.
              I defer to the woman whose queer virginity just sighed,
 

passing through to the next realm.
              We watch the train of its star-dusted gown shimmer off.
 

“I think I am no longer
              interested in certain dresses,” my darling reflects.
 

Her eyes mist with the memory
              of some latter-day cabaret come to pass. I nod,
 

my recognition a corsage
              stuck to her syruped bloom. Her moment. Her shine.
 

“Yes,” I avow. “I too
              only like certain dresses. Mostly the ones pressed tight
 

and dark.” Her milk saucer eyes offer themselves. An unblemished
             pity in her ask. “As in the dresses you like seeing on women?"