One Hundred Years of Solitude

pitiful efforts to appear gay,
pleasant, talkative, but it was
enough to see his sweat and
paleness to know that his
heart was not in it.
Sometimes he would go to
vacant lots, where no one
could see him, and sit down
to rest from the claws that
were tearing him apart inside.
Even at midnight he would be
in the red-light district trying
to console with predictions of
good luck the lonely women