Shuriken Checks In

The foyer of the Drury Inn
is gilded, draped
with chandeliers
and reads like a pickled
twenties ballroom.
The kind of place
where detectives ghost round, investigating
glamorous throttlings,
pouring brandy from decanters
to aid the thinking process.
I should be wearing
a raw silk day dress,
dropped at the waist,
swagged with pearls,
or furs and a wool cloche
topping bobbed hair,
as I enter this giant
Faberge egg.
Instead, I stumble in
from the clammy heat,
smothered in a trenchcoat
three sizes baggy,
clutching it round me
to hide my Jurassic spikes
and calcified scales
from the merry, sherry-quaffing clientele.