The Passing Narcissist

I saw him, taller than corn, a high-collared shirt, and wristy Rolex smile; beguile: the club, deep-dark low, and drawing in the rich and not so and then moving from the brewing bar, the jar of late custom, floated to a sofa, sitting and announced, ”here’s the ladies, come to dance,” and lacquered whores, employed with fizzy drinks, circled him like robbers, buy a horse; And he was hand-made, every detail Sachs, Dior, light and shade; what silver spade had so fashioned, I do not know, such a loathsome song of self-love, and glow? and later when he left, a monarch rising from his borrowed throne, I thought perhaps he wasn’t bad, or wasn’t good, nothing you could finger same, and say Oh yes, it’s plain! and he smiled a smile of self- love, not hope, passing me as I drank; and when he’d gone, I fancied I’d seen the Devil; or the Devil’s name, holidaying fresh from hell; and quickly I looked the room; for candle, book and bell; wondering now if I’d drawn in, his hellish earthly spell.