CUFFING SEASON

Thalia Geiger

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Like fishing a hair out with dirty fingers
that rub the sclera red, micro veins
branch out from tear-ducts all the same--
a map of a popular city,
somewhere like London.

It’s raining more often.
Leggings wet-soaked,
spread tighter to the leg
like neon eviction notices
tacked to swollen doors.

Like something you’ve never seen before.
Like animals, hunting, but the hind-shimmy
and clawed-pounce are more like snow-skips,
near-silent brushes of white powder
flung from the foot.

Despite the incoming mashed potatoes,
the gravy, the buttered biscuits,
bodies keep fit, so fit
the retainer goes back in, makes a home
of a young mouth grown old.
​
Like cavities come spring,
there’s incubation. Like all these, but actually
a gesture of performance, coats drawn like curtains
puffed down and bloated, like snowmen
hiding cards played close to the chest.