Poem XIII

Do you want a taste of the whip?
A lioness lies down to watch the fight
While the red light of dawn bathes all
Three of us in blood
We approach a catastrophe
Animal slave
Are you not a woman of flesh and blood,
Have you not a heart like mine?

Little Judie wakes with her face shoved
Pushed into cushions
There’s a hand on the back of her neck
And her shorts are around her knees
Something prods between her legs
She tries to breath scream cannot
Her eyes widen she struggles
A sparrow ground beneath the heel
She snaps and breaks in two pieces
Then darkness.

A lioness laid down to watch the fight
While the red light of dawn
Bathed all three in blood
Judith
No longer a woman of flesh and blood
No heart like yours or mine
Would you like a taste of the whip
She asks
Can I interest you in broken time?
When syncopated lines are cast
In tones of joy and pain
And the dead lash each other
In a grotesque love charade
Rest your foot upon your slave
Lady of Fables
In matters of love there is no equality
Woman is man’s enemy
To hold and tender quietly.

I feel like a condemned man
When I make love to you
Locked inside strange shudders
The quiver of bronze that
Resonates with howls
I burn alive inside you
Judith Dionysius.