Con artist, English Existential Poetry

Fairly drunk I sit
In an old armchair
The grinning con artist spreads cards
Their red backs all lined up
On the new round table
"I want to show you this trick"
Head shaking cringing polite refusal
There's eight in the room
But he didn't pick me at random
The water drips continue to flow
"I want you to write down
And pick the eight of hearts."
I make the shapes with my pen
Stab at it and the con artist
Takes the card
Looks at it
Then places it face down
"I want you to pick the four of spades."
I repeat my actions
Against all scepticism
I'm now taking this shaggy dog story,
This sham, half-seriously
Best guessing and getting
Curiously involved
And swept up in it contrary to
My better judgment and will
"I want you to write down
Then pick the Queen of clubs"
My choice now an object in-itself
Saunters ponderously along the line
Of these lazy random numbers
Arrayed on their wooden bed
The dead of mathematics
I'm counted all corpses but one
They're shown to me and compared
To the requiem guest-list I made
I was grave-robbed of the ability to make
Correct guesses by the con artist
Who called out the wrong choices
Of card I'd just pulled
As the next to be drawn
Like teeth
It dawned on me how I'd been pawned
By the vampire
The next day when I awoke
In the dark
He's a cheat and undead thief
And he's after all my stuff
The emphasis of his intent
The things he can't touch
Only regard on the face of the card

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