Elizabeth Joy Levinson
INTIMACY
I have not been the lilac
felted tongue of the hosta, wrapped
around the sleeping bee, heavy with pollen and
summer heat, but I have held my breath while it slept,
the pause caught in my throat—
And I do know what this is like, the way
I may climb back into bed some mornings and curl
my whole self between the base of your back and the breadth
of your shoulders, the warm soft where I wait for you to wake,
though some mornings you are more cliff face, unscalable,
and I do not know how to account for the difference.
Only, maybe some days, the bumble bee is drowsy, its guard down.
Others, it swarms in agitation. It has less to do with you
than of my own tendering. Some days you are the defense
and some days, the thing to be defended against.