You and I are an animal with its own body.

I poke it, hoping it will sing.

Instead, it whispers half-stories

About the barren places within us,

The tender, shrivelled,

Smudged and squirrelled away parts;

Those we know about,

Those we don’t.

The soft belly of our animal is plump and velvet and

Hurts when I touch it

Because I am gentle.