Costume Drama

One morning I get an invitation
To a party – fancy dress
A friend’s birthday celebration
And the theme, the Wild Wild West.

The thought of dressing up
Just gets me so excited
I design and make my costume
Imagination so ignited

And when I ring the doorbell
I think ‘This is gonna be such fun!’
But it’s the door to my discovery
That I am the only one

The only one that is, who has
Tried a bit too hard
It’s not the kind of get up
One can easily discard

I’m stood there on the doorstep
Dressed head to foot in green foam
And I shuffle through the doorway
Though now I want to leg it home

In this cool cowboy crowd, you see
I just stick out a mile
It’s a sea of designer Stetsons
All worn cool Madonna style

‘Yee-haa’, says the birthday boy
as he slaps me on the back,
‘You sure had some courage
to come dressed up like that!’

‘That’s great’, he says, ‘that’s….
..what…are…supposed…to …be?
Well, I get all offended -
‘It’s not OBVIOUS, can’t you SEE?’

He scans the vision of green in front of him
Topped with colourful bandana
Pulls at my carefully sewn attachments
In…such…a…pitying…manner…

that…I snap...

‘I’m a cactus of course,
I’m seen in ALL the best wild westerns,
And you’re sucking the sap right out of me
What with ALL these STUPID questions..’

‘Great’, he says, ‘that’s just what I need –
A Happy Birthday row’ and
As he struts off to the kitchen –
‘Seems I’m the boy and you’re the cow!’

‘I’m a Cactus’…who thinks it’s time
to leave this dustball joint
My succulence plainly sucks
And my prickles just lost their point

But as I’m waddling to my exit
My eyes then meet the gaze
Of someone else who’s going through
The same costume-making phase.

He smiles at me, comes over,
Doesn’t tell me what he is –
But I check out his water-filled marigolds
(So I think I get the gist).

He offers me a drink, says
‘Perhaps, you need to cool down’
‘Oh yeah’, I say, ‘and I need some air
What with all this smoke around’

He then starts squirting me with water
From his stuck on plastic teats
‘Fire! Fire!’ he says, ‘don’t panic!
This should relieve the heat’

It’s only now I realise that
Just to get me back,
The birthday boy had used my costume
For stubbing out his fag

I never thought to check if my attire
Was flame retardant
(seems cushion padding’s not the thing
when it comes to party garments)

So my costume’s now in tatters,
Half-burnt and soaking wet
Marigold man’s now deflated
Birthday boy plainly upset

So I decide to cheer him up
By getting in some practice
Of my wild west funky line dance moves
As I dance the Funky Cactus

And the Stetsons, they all love it!
As we move across the floor –
(I wave my prickles in the air
like I just don’t care)
Oh look! How they’re wanting more!

And the birthday boy gives me a grin
There’s a shoot out on the midnight hour
‘Never know’, I say, ‘I might just win
Now I’m one with my cactus power’