This poem first appeared in Double Bill (Red Squirrel Press), 2014.

Behold the baldy man’s conceit, the way he flourishes his comb,
daintily coaxing the last, lank tendrils across his boiled-egg pate.
Watch how he flaunts his Scottish teeth, eyebrows arching coyly
as the seconds stretch. We know what surely happens next.
Just when he stoops that streaky heid FLASH goes the humbling camera.
Just when that simper slips FLASH goes the shaming lens.
Look how it chastens him even as the stool descends. But then:
the rasp of a match, a nimbus of smoke, an emanation of Bach
as if from paradise. See, it’s the wee things that help restore our pride,
and it’s us posers who parade the frailest hide.