POEM OF THE DAY (dedicated with pleasure to Wordsmith.org's word for today: beestings*)
Mercy Dotes for Melissa
In the small hours like lost and found
gloves lacking mates,
my fingertips have closed
over the stars
embroidered on the wet folds
inside the peaked tent
of your vagina,
like eyes brimming with unfallen tears.
My hands need you.
Lambs in wolves’ clothing,
the Siamese twins creep
cloaked in their hairy pelts
among the sleeping pack—
all the moondogs held in sway
to the lucent
virtuoso play of cello,
a fit of gleams down your flank.
Sure as your own pups,
my hands find suck—
The little jaws work,
milk fangs nip,
red tongues lap at your teats,
swabs of damp velvet.
In these blind hours like spoons
asleep in a drawer
my hands are orphan ladles
dousing the witch
steam of your rich broth.
Romulus and Remus
keen to the alpha,
hungry for the weep
of beestings
startled from your nipples.
Dana Pattillo, 1990
*beestings (BEE-stingz) noun, also beastings, biestings
First milk produced by a mammal, especially a cow, after giving birth.
Also known as colostrum or foremilk.
[From Middle English bestynge, from Old English bysting.]
"Two thriving calves she suckles twice a day,
And twice besides her beestings never fail
To store the dairy with a brimming pail."
Publius Vergilius Maro (translated by John Dryden); The Works of Virgil.
(PoD 28)
6:43:08 PM 
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