A Granite Subsistence
Athwart this slab of granite the wok wonks
the hand to steady it steadied me before he
withdrew and departed
the wok wonks with me in the vacuum
The steady hand steadies us strokes
our round black bottoms and cocks
its owner’s head to one side
slides through thick hair and speaks -
“granite cools slowly; that is why it is granite”
the hand told the story of the speckled smooth as
molecules knowing their mates
by the time it takes
to freeze
black leads
later grey
lastly white
his means and I came together a fast end
woks and women cool contemporaneously
but we are not made of stone-stuff
the hand’s story will not tell us
I told the wok she must depart while she still burns
the hand and has compliance
to deformation I had resistance
offered by an elastic body once...
before I stabilized and crystalized
bondage in another white hand’s kitchen
the wok is resigned to her fate
already wedded to the black stove below
a black spot in a sea of grey appliance spots
and white tile spots; in a granite subsistence I find
I cannot move
The cooling has already begun.