lilith-like morning.

he makes the final move

with force.       checkmate.       he thinks the battle's won now.

he thinks he's got your heart---that somehow it's grown

connected to your clitoris 

through evolution	       by miles of chord and plasma.

nerve endings in fingertips	       overstimulated. 	





it's chilly in his room.

well	       your nipples know the answer, don't they?

and it's not the one he's got.	       it's not the soul beneath 

your skin he's concerned with,

but the	light behind your eyes;

the infinitesimal amounts of downy hairs that cover your belly.

he counts them 	      one

	by 	     one.	       he licks his thumb and spreads them out

in sunburst-shaped patterns. . .





he seeks 

to understand.

unsuccessfully.





you dress. 	      it's not the weight of him that disturbs you

       so much as	        the smell.

his scent has become familiar and sticking. it's memorized your curvature,

not unlike his eyes have studied it       	repeatedly.

at an until now 	       safe distance.

one by one

he slaps together your guts,

encases them in bone,	       stacks your vertebrae,

wraps the mass in sinew and covers that with flesh and fills that in



with water. . .

plunks in eyes to see, hollows out ears to hear and nostrils to breath

and mouth to pant, and sigh. . . and lap by. . .

he creates you before him.        	reconstructs and interprets your every angle.





he's made himself a fool-god for you.





this is the truth about sex.	





how many times on how many nights for how many years after this morning

will you want to take it all back?	       why do you rack 

your brain? why bother?	       rewind

play-back the events of that night. . .

your remorse.

isn't that penance enough?	       why ask





if you met him 	      for the first time	all over

and he smiled at you	       that smile of recognition	

from the opposite side

of a too-tiny room	packed with people	and colored strobe lights

and chest-cavity thumping bass. . .

would the music

and the sights, the liquor

and the people swaying back and and forth

sway you to him	       again?





no crime to be	       lonely.

just once.




	
maybe he'll understand that.

• Chy Ryan Spain

to POETRY REFERENCE PAGE

BACK to ME!