There is a hinge
of bone
where your chin joins
your cheek.
I like to stroke it
in the flicker
of a local movie;

I like to take
your laborer;s hand
when you are
cautiously--
(O proof of love!)--
driving my car.

You bring me gifts
of food;
I write you
poems of blood.

Your scars are vertical;
mine are horizontal.

You lost your spleen;
I loosed a daughter
on the world.

Your hinge of bone
tells jokes;
while mine chants
poems.

An unlikely pair,
though which pair
is ever likely?

When I cannot
look at your face,
I look
at your cock--
a question mark
asking the sky

how can
heaven
be fucked?

© Erica Mann Jong

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