Slaminatrix

it’s two in the afternoon
you’re gone now
and I’m lying in bed
rolling in the high of you
my eyelids heavy
tender places swollen

I haven’t had a drink in years
but in this moment I am drunk
and dizzy from our dance
I’d be reeling
if I could stand

wanting more
I linger
no, loiter
in the still-present echo of your voice
getting lower
your breath coming harder
you—lying in another bed
touching yourself with whispers of me
you—in some anonymous hotel room
somewhere in the great American West
you—calling me
for I am too
too far South
for you to come
to me
now

then all we have is talk
but you’re the pro, baby
you can do more sweet damage wielding words
than a hundred men humping
with all their spare parts

that’s why I’m still here
wallowing in the memory of your voice
your voice prowling between a purr and a growl
your voice wrapped around me like a quilt in winter
coiled like a cool, cool snake in the heat of summer
your words penetrate me
deeper than any mere man of flesh
lover, you are three hundred miles away
but I can feel your throbbing pulse with every syllable
you tease me with sinuous verbs
slide inside on the backs of provocative adjectives
make me moan with multi-layered metaphors
and plunge hard core nouns into my willingness

seems I’ve met my match
in you—the strange force driving that wicked tongue
so when I squeeze
the last inch of symbolism from our collaboration
I hear you shudder on the other end of the line
and I explode, drenching you with superlatives
we’re having sex in sestinas
making love on a lyric
you’re banging me with blank verse
baby, don’t stop!
but, oh! your very punctuation makes me gasp

and just like that, you’re gone
slipped into the afternoon of a late spring cold snap
but your words I can keep
savor
luxuriate in the slow burn
they rise up in me

god damn it, man!
you got under my skin
you, with your lush language and cryptic wit
I’ve succumbed to your sensual similes
inhaled your innuendo to intoxication
I live to lick loose the alliteration from your lips
and I can’t stop rocking to our reckless rhythm
No, I can’t even pretend to be cool anymore
I’m on fire
and you can’t put me out cuz
there ain’t no rules of grammar apply here, babe
I’m a wildfire burning through your line breaks

nothin’ you can do but
sit tight
hang loose
saddle up
climb on
dive in
shut up
and
feel the heat

© Lisa Martinovic