Category Archives: poem

As he passed, I reached out and brushed him with the heel of my right hand.  The tender palm of my hand is a tongue and my fingers are grasping lips as I close them around that neglected midpoint; his left hip, where the flared edge of his pelvis is covered by the thinnest skin, forming an intimate handle.  It feels like the knob of a vital door.

This handle will give and then all his parts will be before me, other pairs of sharp corners and softer resting places.  If I could place both open palms against the pair of bony wings holding up his jeans, I could then test the sharpness of each of his long shin bones.  I would expose his curled pale toes, grasping the air for balance during a slow examination.

Are his ankle bones like my own ankle bones?  Cup each elbow and push them back and out, knot his fingers behind his head.  I kiss my own creased palm as I think of all the places where his skeleton almost breathes air.

He could make his own door on my body, forming a handle out of the coiled bone of my shoulder blade by sliding his fingers over and around the edge.