Maxine Rhue T

Maxine Rhue T Oct 2013

want

I hunger for affection
skin to skin contact

I’m desperate for satisfaction
for sleep
and for truth

I’m praying for an idea
clear and crisp as the air of a december night
that can guide me to my destination

I am wasting time wishing
on stars
on nothing at all

Maxine Rhue T Sep 2013

Grin

You have this grin
And when it plays across your face
all I can remember is the way
your tongue glides across my skin

Its the same face you make
when you inhale the scent of my garden

When you start to taste
the nectar as if it were a fine wine

Making sure
that every sip
every lap
and every lick
is slower than
Molasses
making its way along the length
of the Mississippi River

You have this grin
And when it plays across your face
all I can remember is the way
your tongue glides across my skin

It is the gracious grin
that shows in the afterglow
of knowing what you do to me.

Maxine Rhue T Sep 2013

Early Harvest

I was picked early
I wasn't ready
wasn't ripe

In no way was I prepared
to handle the lessons handed to me by a stranger

Not when his hands clawed at my insides
or my outsides

When he smothered my mouth
cutting off my screams
not for a moment
but for years

I was unprepared for his words
what came out of his mouth
taught lessons that should never be learned

When I was picked I wasn't ready

Now I suppose I never will be

Maxine Rhue T Sep 2013

Countdown

One hundred sixty seven days until I am allowed to feel love

Until passion is in my vocabulary
Until my skin may burn like a hot summers day
But I know that the sun is not the source of the heatwave in the South
where the love is a sweet and slow molasses.

For I hail from the North
where the love is cold as each set of eyes
and you think that if you cry enough
the salt water may turn to ice.

Maxine Rhue T Sep 2013

words

Your words
when repeated to myself

taste like sulphur
taste like fire and smoke

like ash
like dirt
like being deserted

Your words
when heard for the first time
sound like nails on a chalkboard

like a child banging on piano keys trying
to play a familiar melody but failing

Your words
remind me of a rule I once thought to be true until I grew a little older

Sticks and stones may break my bones
and all wounds from words eventually heal

but your words are different

Your words
fester

they infect

Your words rot over time leaving the kind of stench you can taste.

The result of your words

is the kind of suffering that not only leaves

an aching in my chest
but a stinging in my eyes
and a burning at the soles of my feet

telling me to run
but before I take off

you speak

Your words
taste like honey
feel like clouds

Your words
sound how love should sound

Your words
stop as you lock the door.

— The End —