I’ll tell you what her trouble is

She’s trying to see a picture
not the thing

She looks at what is not the thing
as if it were the thing
She tries to make it like a thing
that has no thing alike

A picture of him is not him
Nor is the thinking of it him
Nor is the thinking of him him

But she will not know other ways to want

Can she not want what she can not imagine?
Can she not want except the way she knows

She wanted flesh. She wanted his. She thought of it, its unexpectedness, its veryness. Its flesh- ness like an animal a slab, a hunk. She thought of the way it sprang back from her mouth and hand, the way it would and would not bruise, its thicknesses. She thought of it white and pale or brown. She wanted to feel the pulse of it, she wanted to put her hand in it. She thought of the course, the beat, its urgency. She thought of the foolish thought of it, its innocence, its scandal and its staggering, bound-to-failure-ness and yet. She thought of the very it of it, its is. She thought of it in her mouth, she thought of the warm and cool then dry then wet. She thought of the side and the side of the neck and where the mouth might go. She thought of the tongue and vein, the mouth, the waiting mouth, she thought of the want, his want and hers, her want and him, him letting that, she thought of him broken and being broken, the putting up of want, the going through and taking it and that he wept.