<\/p>\n
10,000 Men\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n So there you were, A martini sat one side of you, You slipped a chip The croupier spun So what if that You confessed later <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n John Grey<\/strong> is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in Examined Life Journal, Evening Street Review<\/em> and Columbia Review<\/em> with work upcoming in Leading Edge, Poetry East <\/em>and Midwest Quarterly.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 10,000 Men\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 So there you were, in the Casino, at the roulette wheel with a stack of chips in front of you and, you said, ten thousand men looking over your shoulder all breathless from not knowing what number you\u2019d play next. A martini sat one side of you, a smoking cigarette […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16957"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16957\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17291,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16957\/revisions\/17291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nin the Casino,
\nat the roulette wheel
\nwith a stack of chips
\nin front of you
\nand, you said,
\nten thousand men
\nlooking over your shoulder
\nall breathless
\nfrom not knowing
\nwhat number you\u2019d play next.<\/p>\n
\na smoking cigarette
\non the other.
\n20,000 eyes were on you.
\n20,0002, if you counted
\nthe croupier
\nwhose indifference,
\nyou knew,
\nwas just a mask.<\/p>\n
\non number 7.
\nYou swear the room
\nlet out one giant gasp.
\nOthers placed their bets
\nbut yours was the<\/strong> bet.<\/p>\n
\nthe wheel in one direction,
\nthe ball in the other,
\ntwo journeys
\nyou were sure and certain
\nwould converge
\nright where your
\npiece of light blue plastic
\nsaid they would.
\n10,000 men were certain
\nof the result.
\nThey were in such awe of you.<\/p>\n
\ntraitorous lump of silver
\ndropped into the 23 slot.
\nAnd a rake came out
\nof nowhere
\nand dragged your chips
\ninto the casino\u2019s swollen kitty.
\nThat implement
\ndidn\u2019t round up
\nany of your 10,000 admirers.
\nThey were there to witness
\nyou lose your entire bank.
\nIt wasn\u2019t the luck they gravitated to.
\nIt must have been the perfume.<\/p>\n
\nthat you were just exaggerating.
\nMaybe there was one,
\nmaybe two guys
\negging you on.
\nOne was your husband,
\nthe other your husband\u2019s friend.
\nStill, if there had been 10,000
\nyou had no doubt
\nwhere they\u2019d have gathered,
\nhow they would have behaved.
\nYou\u2019ve seen the movie.
\nYou\u2019ve read the book.
\nThe common thread was you.<\/p>\n