Weekly Poem: ‘All I Know About Love’

By Lynnell Edwards

Let’s take off those pants and get into the box of reptiles!
            — Host Joe Rogan
           “Fear Factor: All Female Version”

And it must start, somehow
with reptiles. And women
wearing pansy-colored
halter tops, taking off
their pants and squealing,
whether with delight
or fear the casual viewer
cannot tell, but must
himself decide which babe
can earn the most points,
by retrieving the most
gold coins from the bottom
of the reptile box.

Son, a good woman will
not take off her pants
because you ask, will not
auction her shame
for shiny objects,
will not bite
the first sweet fruit
you dangle at her lips.

And though I cannot
save you from
the angle of hips
slipping forward,
the slope of a shoulder
under moonlight,
a tangle of hair
spooling like silk
through your hands,

all I know about love
does not contain
a reptile box, race
toward reward, points
awarded the last one standing.

And what slight difference
you will someday divine
between fear and delight,
hold tight when the world
cracks open, shows its black box
of desire, its treasure
of petal, earth, bright fang.

 
Lynnell Edwards is the author of two collections of poetry, both from Red Hen Press: “The Highwayman’s Wife” (2007) and “The Farmer’s Daughter” (2003). She teaches at the University of Louisville.