08/22: hot enough to break
Aug 22, 2017 · 1 min read
Crinkled noodles and an orb-floating egg,
ruby shavings, enoki spears, and scotch-
bonnet pickled bamboo shoots, that she said
would make it hot enough to break the lock
of fever in my shadowed cheeks. Instead
I reached for the competing pepper, salt-
habanero — sun in its own right — red
under yellow, seed-studded to a fault.
There is deletion in delirium
of shining facts and blur-star-blurred features —
we blank into the pinking stun of sun
and call ourselves our only god’s creatures.
We wilt. I broke shiitake broth to brave
the broad capsaicin brine and cabbaged wave.
