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An ache like a seed
caught in teeth, acrid after-
taste of unripe fruit;
astonishment. That
is not what I meant. Sudden
drop of a gaze, new
heaviness. Where are
you going? Strange entrapment
within skin, like the tree-
gum that had to be
cut from Eve’s hair. I
just didn’t hear you.
The twitch of a brow.
She remembers the bitterness
of a beetle crunched
accidentally, hidden in the spinach;
she remembers
the first rasp of ivy rash on the wrist.
Look at me
when I’m talking. Heart pounding
in her ears. A shoulder
shrugs away from a hand. Skin
is not just for pleasure; it
can chafe. She is learning
what a weed is,
and what it does.