Tonight's Poet Corner: Bet
Bet by Belinda Roddie Can we talk about when we kissed after arm wrestling by the hotel swimming pool, seasick on daiquiris and Honolulu air as our bodies tensed up like the tightropes we walk on every goddamn day? Or are we just going to avoid eye contact in our room, tucked away in our queen beds, keeping the AC on such high blast that I can't even hear the ocean or my own thoughts so I can process it all: The lingering strawberry on your lips, your fingers tracing stardust on my jaw, pulses radiating through soaked tank tops as we navigate trauma on an island where we can pretend that everything is okay? It wasn't that I let you win: It was that I couldn't keep up the challenge anymore. Not with the way the sunset turned your hazel eyes into golden spirals. And not with the way you smirked as me, asking, "Are you even trying?"
