Hum of Him

He is full of all the gentle rise

and fall of morning shore 

and gritty sand rolling underfoot.

His hands are loud with touch. 

His teeth, when talking, bounce like 

guitar strings. From his throat come

deep note hums that slide past ears

to brain and plant this fearful 

longing. His chest like an old mountain,

slowly sinking deep between earth’s crust, 

’til it rises like the sun.

He speaks of other women softly and boldly

and often in mornings, when the windows

allow a daily rumble of traffic to seep in,

when catching my breath is like catching 

a baseball in my mouth and swallowing, 

and I pray for the stillness of night when 

I hear just the sound of sheets around him. 

I need a music box to keep 

this secret in. The kind 

with a tin sound you crank out 

by hand. His drummer’s hands, 

of course, I’d hold them still 

and say: I listen for bells and 

songbirds to hear you in.

Back