WE LACK SUBSTANCE

A bar. Dimly lit with buzzing neon. The vile stench of desperation of hormone soaked minorsFilters through a screen of cigarette smoke and strobe effects. Our minds lost in a haze of gin and recreational medicines. My pessimistic hand loosely grips a half empty glass. All around me are the smiling faces of the blindly optimistic.

“This” you say “is our youth. The best days of our lives,
and we are here, wasting time with wasted minds.”

I ask, “Should we go?”

You shake your head no, so we sit staring as skeletons dance to the music we’re deaf to. A hundred pairs of eyes, heavy with glitter, skins unnaturally pallid, worn, stretched tight over elongated limbs. They spin intoxicating circles round one another.Girls part their heavily glossed lips as a sign of their wanton sexuality. We are ready, they cry, take us. We question ourselves, our minds vacant and unwitting.

Are we the ones who are lost? The music is loud, but still we are deaf; so the children dance in silence.