At sixteen someone handed her a red Solo cup
filled high with cheap beer
and said, let’s go to talk to boys.

She got a job and the cup turned to glass
with wine smooth enough to make small talk
nice.

Then she moved to a city where cool people lived
she left the party with a buzz
and a head full of poems to write.

But now at parties,
she weaves through the crowd
excuse me, sorry, excuse me,
toward a window, where she can stand alone and look out.

It isn’t that she doesn’t want the party.
It’s just that she’d rather be like this
a whiskey cradled in her hands, a view
and the company of friends and strangers
at her back, warming her shoulders like a winter fire.

So that late that night when her husband asks,
she can answer honestly,
I had a really good time; it was just the kind of party I like.