She had me between ‘duh’ -
and the nonchalant, sultry blur
of her unruly hair; and the pouty,
smouldering incandescence of
her blood red lips; shimmering
life-like in the dull, barely there
blues and reds and flickering
purples of the BeeJay’s mirror ball.

We were like two large -
lumps of rock;boulders locked
in the unwilling, eternal waltz
of gravity; stuck in distant orbits
around the crowded dance floor
like as around a stranded, listless star.
In the interludes between the
mindless drone of the DJ’s songs,
and the rude, insistent scratch
of his beatbox our eyes
weave and bob, like corks
floating in a sea of ice cold beer.

But we never ever cross
the invisible lines of propriety;
and when the clock chimes 3.16
and the barman’s cleared throat
sounds the final knell for our
unwilling dance, we are still those
self same rocks; in step, but still apart,
with the cold, dark emptiness
of impassive space and the memory
of what mights between us