She took a spike and tapped it
into my head and ate a spoonful of my thoughts.
“Bitter,” she said.
I did the same, but hers were sweet.
Afterward, we cracked open our
chests and held our hearts out
for the other. But you just
can’t stay friends after something
like that. Lovers, no problem.
We watch the snow fall from the
bedroom window, first of the year.
“How long will it last?” she asks.
“All week, most likely.”
“Christ, more bullshit,” she says.
Christ and bullshit, I whisper.
We sit by the window and
watch the snow, wondering what
part of the other we will eat tomorrow.
Fingers, maybe. Maybe souls.
Anything but eyes.
Spencer K. M. Brown is a poet and novelist from the foothills of North Carolina, where he lives with his wife and son. He is the winner of the 2016 Penelope Niven Award, the 2018 Flying South Prize, and finalist for the Thomas Wolfe Prize. His poems and fiction have appeared in numerous publications. He is the author of the novels Move Over Mountain (J.New Books 2019) and Hold Fast (Wiseblood Books 2022), and the poetry chapbook, Cicada Rex (Ghost City Press 2023).