He asks if I have a spoon.
No, he asks if I can spoon,

or have, or will or want to.
Yes, yes yes and then please

hold onto me like melted butter
the drizzle of which flows slow

like snow that begins above
and falls below and in between

becomes the in-between.
I am neither solid nor liquid,

my body a curled shrimp
his a harshly lovely shrimp

and we're mates flung on a ship, veiled
by a net of words and grunts and

and and and...
I didn't hear what he said.

I heard but I didn't hear,
my brain adjusting the aesthetic

maybe even the pitch, timbre,
reverberation of what was really spoken.

I curl around the truth of words
and turn a new truth that juts out

begging for a hand to hold,
no, sizzling for it, the heat

of my internal heat
cracking my skin open and

look, no blood, just
the vulnerable pink meat

of me emerging to tell him
things that speech cannot confirm.

__

This poem was written when I was reading Robin Behn's Horizon Note, so a lot of her techniques rubbed off on it. For instance, repetition of words but with different meanings (spoon the noun/spoon the verb) and concentrating on controlling the pacing (yes, yes yes) almost making a stuttering out of it. I also find that 2 line stanzas really help me focus on tightening everything up. Plus, I was craving buttery shrimp.