All That Glitters

Her eyes do not change color when 
he tells her he struck his woman 
once. Maybe it’s because she dug for it 
and he admits this so plainly, 
without excuse. Or maybe 
because they are still in bed, and she is 
ensconced in plumes of purple silk. 
They curve into bookends, hands drifting 
over one another’s feet and tomes of poetry. 
In three years, he will still call her, Lover, 
on the phone, will say he understands 
why she needed to overturn the bookshelf, 
how the wall asked for that hole, 
why her dishes needed to hurl to the floor, 
how her father’s temper sprung sudden 
from her temples like bright voodoo pins, 
why she dialed an old flame and not her mother. 
His tongue will hum—ever a hive of bees, 
Remember how you cracked open my 
ribs and found what was lodged there? 
She will say, It certainly wasn’t honey. 
He will say, And yet, you keep coming 
back for more.

—BIANCA SPRIGGS