9/02/21 by B.A. O’Connell

I have a hunger—

a foolish desperation;

you appear to me as the barbed wire wall

I cannot climb—

every time I touch the

memory of you

I am covered in new stigmata—

you hang about my ugly body

like the rotting grapevine

and the stench of long-gone fruit

and decay

seeps into me

until no living thing dare touch me again.