The thousand cast iron lamps

sets the scene in a Sunset Boulevard way

and the silhouette of a hundred dancers,

their skirts flying, lifted

by the whispering fog,

their hair tied back and tempting the trilby

they wear, the adjustment and nod

to femininity only seen as the

plucked flower, dead soon,

dipped in gold leaf, sits proudly, stuck fast

by a silver pin through its heart,

erect and glowing in the dampness

of the drooping Boulevard air.

 

The hero shakes in the clammy mist