A Night at the Bar

Loud pulsing club music,

within a post-modern, 

no fish-and-chips,

Irish pub specializing in the typical daiquiri,

a snake bite, a nine-euro watered-down Long Island Iced Tea,

and a mixed fruit Jameson.

New friends mix with the old -

all drinking by themselves next to others -

all yelling over the  music about work,

about failed and triumphant affairs,

about fresh geopolitical conflicts -

   which none truly know the answer for,

and that hot new neighbor who moved in next door...

All for the conversational dominance that

loud club music - which no one dances to -

even can afford...

The fresh faced fly in,

the downtrodden drunks dribble out,

the taste of silky Guinness coaxes the mind

into finding silence a midst the chaos -

only for a breath and a gulp,

as the bass beats it all away.

Bartenders with glassy and bored eyes fill,

refill, relinquish alcohol for the slam of a five

on the table, the counter, the bar -

one down, six up,

more to drink for an exuberant price.

"One more in, one more down,

one more cheer for shot-ing the Crown,

one more drunk, one more stud,

one more to get out of the rud..."