wigglefree

A lip split like love
Posted by nagoonberry @ 2004-04-12 14:49:55 EST
recall
that half cooked affair

and our mother who prepared
engorged liver
nearly as large as the ducks that yielding or unyielding
were nevertheless split in two
were nevertheless opened and laid bare.

that dense center is where
those ducks accumulated their despair
eating while heaving
heaving that eat. they
force fed their grief. I

swell to think of it. I swelled
to eat it: my heart inflamed,
and inside myosin walls
foam cells inflated. Feeding
off remnants of that engorged grief
I unsated
that meat.

This delicacy
was my mothers favorite dish-
and we were forced to remain
seated until finished.

but that night-
that night of the half cooked affair

my fork tines stabbed at something other
than dinner
and landed somewhere near that soft center
containing my mothers
own heavy liver. from that gash
gaping, came

a lip split like love,

and my mother stopped salting that meat
stopped spicing the garnish
stopped forcing us to eat.