Cosmetically enhanced,
she combs her furred shoulders
with retractable claws.
She thickens her pubic hair,
adds tattoos between her thighs
that glow infrared when
she dims the lights
with an imagined lover.
Modulating rainbows
wheel in her eyes
to disconcert even
the casual admirer.

She is a transitory captive
to her mirror, when even this
display is not enough.
As an antidote to vanity
she has coitus with a cyborg,
alternating the taste of ecstasy
from pleasure to pain,
an unnatural karma,
a bright bouquet,
that fades from memory
when she shuts it off.

Most often she awakens
to grapple with frustration.
She frequents the clubs
where the bored collect,
posed, poised to discover
her imagined lover in the shadows,
but handsome features deceive,
and she finds no common syntax
save that of self-indulgence.

She endures the ceremonial chatter,
ostentatious preludes promising romance.
When conversations polarize, love
seems a stillborn reverie

of frayed fantasies and the tedium
of extended life in this utopia.