Three Poems from April Michelle Bratten

Blueberry


I do not believe in
your untouched body of water.

I know other mouths
have drank greedily from yours,
but I come still, feet wet,
to walk your waves.

I will not be separated, nor tangible,
in your flood,
because I do not fear your dampness.

You can watch me hover,
a blue thief for your warmth,
naked,
toes dipping your fluid parts.

You might attempt to drown me,
bring me under,
pulsing, and gasping
for one last breath of you,

but I am whipped like air,
that sucking noise at your nape,
that blast against your chest!

No,
I will not go,
will not sink away from your sky of glass.

I will keep to your chest,
hungry,
but a rumble that grinds low.

For I am not chained to your sound,
or that extra beat
that your heart will not squeeze,

because I am round and particular,
the solid that melts into words.

Have me,
or melt with me,
that frozen blueberry
that you leave thawing,
drenching your hand in wonder.





Savages


I have bent my legs beneath me
and have claimed to know her soul,

but she is forever a dark pool,
with mysteries buried in a red bathing suit.

She does not know the simplicity of my cup,
nor how it fills,

but, "ah",
(if she opened her mouth,)

my tongue would gather life,

deepening and pushing,
to swallow all her dark reds,

tangy, quaking against the vine.

I have dreamt of my woman's lips
parting to endanger her flesh,

the salts of her slim waist,
magnified in the glass of my fingers.

But as I wake,
the light is thankless,
squandering any devotion.

My movements are now without poetry,
knocking the rags and shadows
against the quiet of the room.

I shatter and betray,

plunging,
and falling for

the savage in all men.






Molasses


Your fingers graze,
then pause,
settling on
the nakedness of my hip.

Your breath shadows
and dampens
the place where shoulder
and neck softly connect.

But my Love,
I only wish to set bare your mind--
to read it as a map,
to memorize your cell paths.

From there I could sail your dark blood,

until
you
trickle
thick
just
as
molasses,
you
with
your
so
slow
fill
my cup.


April Michelle Bratten is a writer currently living in Minot, North Dakota. She was recently nominated for Best of the Web and the Pushcart Prize. She co-edits the online journal Up the Staircase.



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