WITTY FAY

Anima

 

There is a book ladder growing out of my right cheek

Piercing the flesh of the ceiling,

Smiling at the translucent bulb

Of yellowish glow around its nakedness.

When it reaches the roof of the sky

Or that of the sun’s mouth,

Against the frilly pinafore of the day,

I smile at the library inside my mind

And climb it breathless into the arbor of you,

Hyphenated into me.    

 

 

 

Beheading

 

              

I flinch not from the javelin, the spear or the bullet,
Nor am I shielded in cast iron.
Still, heart and vein are safe 
From thoughts of life and force,
Getting lost within the four chambers.
It is the reverse side of fear 
Where vulnerability is offered with both hands
That I hide from your eyes.
The diversity and opulence of the square inch of skin,
Swathed by the stealing gaze,
Makes the most intriguing attribute of us.
Something growing in a certain place of my world
That comes unclothed and at risk,
First to the mirror, then to the touch of your hands-
It is the very neck of love.
When the face falls like a cowed Cain,
It is such reminder of the otherness
In both of us, as sin and grace 
Inhabit the rest of the world.