Night and Day

Starless skin
Sunset arms wrapping around me
Mouth cupping over mine like dusk
I saw the unseen in shoulders
Someone interrupted that invisible comfort

Young butterscotch candy skin
Whined R & B in my adolescent ear
Coughed out clumps of jealousy in laughter
He thought my bowed head might make me
Give up this midnight boy
since I resemble dawn

Sometimes, I still hear him singing
Yeah, butterscotch brother wanted to crack me
into pieces of walnut shell and meat, but
Another pair of hands held me,
Virgin astronomer
safe and secure in the dark

- Tara Betts, copyright 1999