eros – inclemency

by Elaine Long

Wet and glossy under the sun's forecasted shadow:
a fistful of broken feelings
left to blossom in the hothouse and
a slab of loam to bake the earth
soft and sour.

I till it easy-over
slip what's left onto the plate,
grease the palms and sip my
coconut water.

In the stroke of time
the jaw of space
crunches in
a pain
aux raisins.

The last man and the first sun
is a bittersweet revelation,
late one night
of the week
for thirty years
I have sat in the presence of a dying crowd.

There is life in a murder's nest, too -
I hear the feeding
the hunger
the blind, flightless
flailing.

I have tasted darkness,
nightshade, and ivy coils
spat out like a love poem
from the cash register.

If you find space at the right
bar, the tectonic plates
break their uneasy truce and
buttery warmth
spilling over the counter becomes
a financier
to an open mouth.

This poem is a public submission created for Red Room Poetry's New Shoots digital poetry anthology.