The Last Birthday Party

It's an illustration: a table with plastic forks & paper plates, some still holding half-eaten pieces of chocolate cake.  A candle has fallen to the floor.  There's a dog eating something, you can't see what, that the animal has gained by pulling the tablecloth down.  & there's shredded wrapping paper, & no more presents to be seen.

It's a promise.  When people are around, you drink too much, you don't notice how drunk you are & then you think you can drink yourself to the other side.  & you hate surprises.  & you hate people, if you're being honest with yourself.  Especially these people.  People you've even called friends.  They can barely see.

It's a moment of recognition.  After everyone left, you struggled to sweep up but you should've asked for help.  It was so kind of your children to come see you but you wish it weren't an obligation based on occasion.  It doesn't matter anymore.  You aren't getting any younger & soon enough you won't be getting any older.

It's a matter of forgetting.  Something someone might have celebrated sometime before, maybe before you were born, was just worn down by time, like the etched writing faded on a centuries-old tombstone.  You want to ask someone about it but nobody seems to know, or remember, or ultimately, to even care.

It's the last birthday party.  Because everything has to have its last, because, of course, nothing lasts.