Affections from a Former Mail Order Bride to a Newly-Wed Husband
Bitch
(for Carolyn Kizer)
by Kristin Naca
I.
I slap your face
say your name & hold
youinsides flailing
till you slip, turn, & shake
me down with your knuckles
to the groove below
my eye, clinching
skin between your teeth.
My limbs lose to the cuffed
control, the tight & straight-laced
jive tying back my sex
like
a slip-knot. They say
we shouldn't
have arms, legs, & muscles ache
with spark, with burn.
I remember
days like gasoline
& bystanders jeering with
flames of dyke &
bitch
ripping through
to
hold lips to my lips, your
thigh against mine &
fingernails
to my naked bellythis,
& the way you clamp
your sex, hard around
my
tightened fist.
II.
The cold burn of snow,
Your white fingers slap
Against my dark skin.
Red imprint stings with
Blood & the quick pull/release
Of my pulse pleading
Yes & no & again.
& I say this color don't
Rub off & baby I know
When a beating's
A beating. This is something
Daddy don't
Talk abouthis white
Skin against mine,
The sweat from his hand,
The smell that stays
On my skin for a week/
The one that doesn't smell,
The pleading that don't
Say nojust
No more. Marked my skin
With Blood & Emptiness.
But your white against
My yellowness, traces
Of vapor coming off
Your breath, oil from
Touches painting my body,
My gritty and colorless
Scars fill with you,
Blood & the quick pull/release
Of my own pulse pleading
Yes & no & again.
III.
Bitch, my skin is
Twisting in your hands, my face pressed
against the gridiron sky,
My eyes fill with tears
My ears laughing. And when I say
I love you, it is with
Everything I am and everything you are
And so my bitch I love you
and bitch you.
Bitch this world.