Impossible! A giant horse
dancing through the hotel lobby
with a brass band, throwing out coins.
The bride comes after
her flowered accomplices,
and then the groom, a bit red-faced,
with taunting friends screaming
to join, to join, to sing,
to dance, to play.
Tired and not young,
heavy with witnessing, late
beyond years—
Of course we do.
Some with cameras,
some with their own red feet,
the trinkets aside,
real coins, gaped smiles,
And the abandon
of a horse on four human legs
leaping beyond all check-out counters,
porters, maitre d’s, sofas,
chairs, beyond tourist and native,
Arab, Christian, Muslim,
brown or red, tired or young—
To follow a music so raucous
and riveting, so wed of all catching life
We cannot deny the trumpets,
pretend, unjoin, or fail to snake along,
chanting the love-night on.