Hostess
by Tony Hoagland

All I remember from that party
is the little black dress of our hostess
held up by nothing more
than a shoestring of raw silk

which kept slipping off her shoulder
--So the whole time she was talking to you
about real estate or vinagrette,

you would watch it gradually
slide down her creamy arm
until the very last moment
when she shrugged it back in place again.

Oh the business of that dress
was non-specific and unspeakable,
and it troubled all of us

like the boundary of a disputed territory
or the edge of a borderline personality.
It was like a story you wanted to see
brought to a conclusion, but

it was also like a story stuck
in the middle of itself, as it kept on
almost happening, but not,
then almost happening again--

It took all night for me to understand
that dress was designed to fail like that;
the hostess was designed to keep it up,
as we were designated to chew

the small rectangles of food
they serve at such affairs, and to salivate
while the night moved us around in its mouth.