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Posts Tagged ‘delight’

Involuntary

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on August 18, 2025| 6 Comments »


 
 
I love the small sounds of pleasure
people make when taking the first
sip of coffee, or when sitting at last
after standing for hours. That small
hum of delight that escapes the lips
when someone presses a thumb
into the arch of our foot and makes
small circles on the sole. That sigh
that flies out when we step into shade
on a relentlessly sunny day. Bless these
moments when the mind can’t outbrain
the small animal living inside us, when
our feral self slips through the cage
of decorum and groans or purrs
or moans or gasps and reminds us
beneath all our fancy syntax and
pretty words, we’re creatures,
and the body is so much more
than a carrier for the intellect.
Every roar and crow, hiss and howl,
murmur and whimper and trill
is a primitive prayer, an involuntary
thank you for being granted
a body that can slip into warm and
soapy water, that can press its lips
to another’s soft lips, that can inhale
the perfume of rain after months of drought,
that can curl into the warmth of another
and through scent and touch know
it is safe, it is loved, it is home.
 

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Positive Side Effect of Exhaustion

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on October 6, 2024| 8 Comments »

Inside me fear and delight take a nap.
They have wearied each other
with their wrestling. Look how sweet
they are there, curled into each other
like two cats, one white, one black.
Look how their chests rise and fall
in unison, as if they can’t help
but attune to each other—
like two heart cells
that can’t help but sync.
The moment I’m more awake
they will be at it again,
pouncing, batting, tussling.
But for now, the easy duet of their purr,
the limp weight as they curl deeper in
as if for once there’s no question
they both belong.

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All Night Long

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on March 1, 2015| 1 Comment »

let’s say they are lovers
guilt and delight
one keeps on laughing
as the other
turns out the lights

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Have You Felt It, Too?

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on February 18, 2015| 5 Comments »

In spite of everything, an odd delight
upsurges in the body, like a tide
that claims a rocky shore, or like a wide
and widening pool of morning light—
except it’s messier. It spills, despite
our thin attempts to hold its force inside.
It sloshes, splatters, overflows. It slides
and slips, it floods, upends, engulfs, unrights.

Oh fierce irrational joy! It doesn’t care
about the setting. Doesn’t care who sees.
It soaks us with its ecstasy, its strange
unruly grace. And then it’s gone. No prayer
or pretty please will make it stay. And we
are changed: yes, still ourselves, but rearranged.

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