The mutant lemons that bend the branches are perfect
for batting practice.
You deliver a ripe one into my strike zone.
A wet thud against my bat is a contract
connecting
Intention to completion
Pitch to timber
Query to quash
You to me.
The sound of rind whacked from flesh over and over and over
The smell of the sticky, sting-y spray
Is clean
Is easy
Is final.
I stand
ankle-deep in canary-yellow carcasses.
Will it be like this always?
You creating the conditions for such certainty?
I was never fond of strict lines, my citrine valentine,
separating
Hit from miss
Sweet from sour
Yours from mine
I respond to every sun-ripened riddle until there are no riddles left.
You stand beside a naked tree.
Cory Nakasue is a movement educator, therapist, writer, and astrologer. She has worked in theatre and dance as a choreographer, director, and dramaturg in the US and UK for over 25 years. She’s studied performing arts composition and theory at Middlesex University and California Institute of the Arts.
Cory is working on her first chapbook of poems.