Another souvenir of my visit to the 1996 Waterloo Poetry Festival, letta simone-nefertari neely's booklet When We Were Mud reached out and grabbed me with Rhonda, Age 15 Emergency Room and I didn't find this poem until much later. It's one of my favorite sexy poems: I like how the writing connects me to the smell and feel of her beloved's body in a very visceral but not excessively graphic way.
Looking at the moon through fogged glass panes,
I am remembering how full your breasts have become now;
swelling slowly each month
until this time when you and the moon
consummate your sisterhood
Your full soft breasts, I am imagining them
inside my mouth
my tongue tasting you till you rise and I am missing you
and the moon, she keeps smiling
but she is not enough
I am with you wherever you are now
We are riding a cocteau wave
and spinning round in blue circles
I want to kiss you but you are not here now
and the moon is too far.
I am manifesting love with you
Can you feel me kissing your back with me here
and you miles away and still moving?
Can you feel me brushing the back of your knee with my lips?
These body parts don't really have names,
just feels and you feel like rippling water
and soft green moss all the time
You are missing from me and the moon
she keeps smiling but she is not enough/ there
has never been anyone who can touch me
like you do even now when you are not here
Looking at this moon through fogged glass
panes, I am remembering our together
when we were so together that the waves
cradled us and lifted us to the moon
like a holy african/ ancient irish presentation of birth
When the waves lifted us
to sister moon
and we held each other because everything
real was so close,
we were bathing in it
and there was no difference in our bodies
even our smells were the same
This is not a love poem
this is a miss you badly poem
but if you were here i would drape this
not a love poem around you
and taste you exactly what it says
—letta simone-nefertari neely