This bohemian birthday celebration—bread, cheese, and wine instead of cake—is the kind of cosmopolitan happening that rarely occurs anymore. The apartment is full of artists, and the discussions are beguiling and intelligent. We strike up a conversation with someone wearing a T-shirt celebrating Moxie, a viciously foul soda, and we learn that the anise-laced liquid is the source of the phrase "You've got moxie," which originally referred to people who were brave enough to drink the stuff.

A turtleneck-wearing man stops the music, introduces himself, and then reads a poem, which he dedicates to The Stranger. We think it's positive (although poetry has never been our forte, and he does refer to a former Stranger intern as a "bitch.") When he's done, the hostess asks for a "happy birthday-related [poem]." The resulting ode, titled "Machine-Pen Tongues," doesn't seem to be either happy or birthday-related. On completion, our poet announces that he has chapbooks for sale. "If you don't buy a book," warns the hostess good-naturedly, "you're gonna hear more poetry."

The apartment features a professional photography studio, and people are posing for fancy glamour shots. A friend who couldn't attend calls instead, and the birthday girl puts us on the phone with him, instructing him to share a quote about her: "It's great that our little pixie is... another year younger at heart," he says. We hand the phone back to the birthday girl. She grins at us and then asks him, with moxie, "Did you say the quote about my boobies?"

Want The Stranger to hear poems about the sitcoms Friends and Just Shoot Me at your house party? E-mail the date, place, time, and party details to partycrasher@thestranger.com.