You watch me like a cat watches
a spider. I see myself in your
mouth, a single leg my protruding
goodbye. Your needle teeth
puncture me. I imagine tastes,
textures: crunchy at the ends,
soft in the middle, the sticky
popping of my reproductive
organs, tart bile, the rank
unctuousness of my entrails,
uncooked andouillette awash
in your saliva. Death by enzyme.
You’d remember me for the time
it takes to lick my taste from your
muzzle, to clean your claws
with your tongue. Nutrients
digested, you’d find a patch
of loose soil somewhere
in the neighbourhood
(for hygiene, not too close)
to dump me, to bury me
with careless scratches
in a shallow grave, then wander
off to fixate on some other
unsuspecting creature.
They should put a bell
around your neck.
Copyright. Robin Knight.
Robin Knight is a mixed-race writer, based in Sussex, England. His poetry has been selected for publication by Rattle, The North, The Perch, SOUTH, Filling Station, The American Journal of Poetry, Griffel, The Dewdrop, The Whirlwind, Halfway Down the Stairs, Haunted Waters Press, Visual Verse, Artificium, Beyond Words, The Bangalore Review and others. He has written for Psychologies Magazine and True West and co-authored with Xanthe Gresham-Knight a book of Children’s Folk Tales for The History Press. His first Novel Coyote, a literary fiction set in Northern Mexico in the early 19th Century is seeking a publisher. Visit him at https://www.robinknightwriter.com/
