Someone singing of fruit
in a fine tenor
pushed his finger against my abdomen.
My lightly downed flesh dimpled
into a pearly crater
slightly puckered at the edges,
blood vessels appearing through
its growing translucent glow
as he pressed harder and harder
till the overstretched membrane
which contains me, my skin
broke into petals of tissue
and the forefinger entered
the remarkable coiled lengths
of my great intestine.
The cream coloured tiles we put in
together some months ago
now protected my walls,
so that his untrimmed and rather dirty fingernail
scraped harmlessly against
a cool ceramic Spanish glaze
grouted in pale blue.
I tensed my lower stomach muscles
to prevent his entire hand and arm
and shoulder from forcing through,
then applied a quick gel-pack
second tissue dressing
which welded the bole of his trunk
roundly into the regular
and unhurried swell of my breathing.
He’s left with one lone digit
stalled in a flailing motion
like a lobster claw outside the creel,
when the whole crustacean creation
is inside trapped for dinner
and waiting to be boiled alive.
He is, apart from one small part of him,
locked out in the world’s food chain
and no doubt the chef will be along any day
with a very large pot.
Meanwhile his forefinger remains embedded.
It will be all thats left of him soon.
Though in a sensationally indulgent position,
it has no escape from its escape
and is rendered hygienic and harmless
by our nestbuilding instinct
and DIY forethought.