Tonight's Poet Corner: An All-Consuming Passion

An All-Consuming Passion
by Belinda Roddie

The stardust tonight is thick.
It is served hot, with sugar,
in mugs. You expect the stinging
sensation of fireworks in between
your teeth as you swallow. A metaphor
ironically cooled down, for the sake
of savoring a heat that cannot
be digested by a human being.

But the heat is bearably
overwhelming, and here,
on a mattress deflating under
our weight, I feel your pulse
quickening like the current of bay water
outside our window. There is
a reminder of cosmos on your tongue,
tasting me, sampling me, like fine
cuisine on a sizzling black plate.

How long will it be until I grow exhausted
and yearn for something cold
to be pressed against my forehead,
drawing the flame out in a single globule
so it can be dropped into a cup and
sealed like a palpitating mass of
excited fireflies? And will you

find solace in kissing
the perspiration on my brow,
the salt as sharp as stars, the things
we give a texture to even when
we cannot actually touch them
with our free fingers - farther away
than we imagine, close enough to idolize
in the mess of sheets hiding our
choreography, the dance as dense
as the muck we drink from coffee cups,
stifled with just enough sugar?