by Lily Pond
I was so wet from my own desire, and his tongue, that my need to be filled up became enormous. But I held off. I lay him on his back. I explored his shoulder, his flanks, the line from neck to pelvis, following it with my tongue.
He swelled inside my mouth, a fruit that has to burst its skin. Comfort me with apples for I am sick of love. And it is a comfort, isn’t it, the root, growing so solidly from its mossy bank, the bounty of abandonment, the cry that means full stop.
We were riding each other now, perhaps not kindly, like twin animals. I gave over first. He waited a while, then joined me. On top of me, he was all weight. His head was on my shoulder. My arms were around him, and my legs. I joined the soles of my feet together. We must have slept.
When we woke, or came to, I really wanted a bath. We walked into the bathroom. We had left the tub with a quarter of an inch of water in it and the salts, unmelted, collected near the closed drain. He turned the water on and the salts turned into green suds.
The bath was large enough for both of us. I felt I had to comment on its size.
“Did you get a bath this big so you could bring people into it?”
“What people did you mean?”
“People like me.”
“There are no people like you.”
“I mean women you’ve fucked.”
“Do you like the scent of these bath salts? Calendula. From nasturtium.”
“You’re changing the subject.”
He took a thick, pinkish cloth and washed between my legs. Then he put the cloth down and with the lather he’d made between his hands, he soaped me, as if what he really wanted was to clean me, but we knew that was a dodge, a trick. I reared up out of the water, held myself up, then sank down.
He helped me out of the tub and dried me, chafing me with the roughness of the towel. He brought me back to bed. He lay on his back. I knew what he was expecting.
Why does being sucked make men look so overwhelmed? There’s a kind of surrender to it—maybe because their legs are so big—that’s unlike anything I can imagine a woman conveying.
He moved my head and put me on my back.
“I won’t be up to much for a long while. I could when I was younger, but not now. I’m delighted, though, to be at your service all night long.”
“You’re on,” I said.
We fell asleep and it was serious this time. I felt I could sleep forever. The fan overhead lapped my exhausted skin with fresh air. Fresh, as if no one had used it before. I loved the feeling of his warm skin, but after a while I had to roll away from him; his body was a furnace. I wanted to hold his hand, but at the same time to feel alone, so I could sleep, next to him but not too close.
I didn’t sleep for long. I could see that it was four-twenty by the digital clock. I could concentrate only on my own hotness so I got up and went into the kitchen. I opened the refrigerator door looking for that blue pitcher, hoping he’d refilled it. And he had! I stood naked in the kitchen, which was dark except for the moon. My feet looked very white and thin on the black tiles. I took the whole pitcher of water and poured it over my head. I admired myself for the gesture. I stood in the middle of the floor, letting the icy cold drip onto my shoulders. When I opened my eyes, I noticed him in the doorway. He came over to me and touched my wet hair.
“Do you know you have slices of lemon on the top of your head?” he asked.
I felt a little foolish, how could I not, but he laughed as he took off a couple of the slices, he was still laughing as he put his face on my breasts, nicely cool from the ice water. I knew he wanted his rough cheeks cooled. He led me back into the bed. He opened a bottle of lavender oil and oiled my breasts and stomach, paying particular attention to my belly, which he covered in circular motions. He used a shockingly wasteful amount of oil to stroke me: I could see waste was the point. I was the most voluptuous thing in the world, more fluid than solid; I gave in to my own liquidity, and to the thrumming motion of his middle finger, which traveled up and down as if there were a string it was plucking, a string I now understood must have been there all the time.
Reading (You) in Bed
Edward Kleinschmidt Mayes
You are what I read, creamy handmade paper you
bound
with love
bound for
love
your vellum
wet wet
ink
blush
I can blush for you
wet pages
folding and
unfolding folds of wet paper
hard
under soft covers
close that book
and open this one
slip into something
slip into something
you leave your watermark
you slide out of something
you slide
when the bed moves
the bed moves
we are in a house that shakes
turn all the pages
I’ve memorized
your vowels
proofed
every inch
your crossed T’s
I want to uncover you with silk
there
your body is not what
I just read about
there
you are once
again open for me
I want to place
my finger
(there)
on all your pages
April
James Scofield
She played all day in the center of my field,
supple and strong, a shape from deep in the eye,
arched below a game of ball and catch,
caught between the blossom and the fruit,
and I tied to a day of dying light.
Alive with dance and song the ground gave way,
fifty-six summers in motion at once;
my blood slowed trance-like in the altered scene,
as fresh cream legs broke my breath in half,
a martyr to a motion not my own.
Turning and turning in that spinning day,
I watched the wind gather up her blue dress;
breathing hard I rode between those lovely tits,
and young shoots spread upon my inner world.
Throughout my field the green came up forever.
Another Sign of June
Robert Shuster
DOMINICK’S CLOTHES, SOGGY, droop in the Kansas heat. Even his socks seem heavy. Words mix with dust that hangs everywhere. Stop that kicking, Sampson, you just make more of the stuff, he wants to yell, but instead, throat dry, his brain still half full of last night’s whispered fragments, he reads the lineup: Tucks at first, Conner at short, Roy catching, who’s he kidding? Roy is pathetic at the plate. But Dominick puts Roy third to quiet the kid’s bleating goat-father and to please Ruth who thinks everyone should get a chance.
Fielding practice was pathetic, too, because that’s when his wife Ruth arrived, wearing the cap he’d forgotten, lugging the beer he likes to sip after games, and suddenly he couldn’t hit a damn ball past the infield dirt. The outfielders, a scrawny bunch, not one with an arm, except maybe Silette, looked surprised, even scared. Hey, Dom, we need practice, too, they finally said. He dropped the bat, said that’s enough, and greeted Ruth at the backstop. Her feet, bare except for sandals, were already dirty. Domino, don’t look like you just lost. Opening day. And she laughed, pushing his cap through the wire. He smelled the suntan lotion on her arms. Wait, Dominick. She fished in her bag, pulled out a handkerchief, and wiped his brow. Lies, he thought, my head is leaking lies. You know, she laughed again, I might get drunk just tryin’ to cool off. But I’ll save you some.
In the dugout Dominick watches his players, slouching teenagers, shuffle out to the field. Run, look alive, he yells. Still low, the sun gives their white uniforms a yellow hue. The smell of Ruth’s lotion lingers—on his cap?—a smell of freshness, of June, of beginning.
Muffled thwacks, Randy’s warm-up tosses. Randy’s a quiet kid, sloppy, even his delivery is sloppy, but the fastball is speedy somehow. Ruth likes him (he’s how I imagine you at that age, Dom), the kind of kid she thinks about having. Maybe in a year, Domino? He grips the wire squares, heart pounding. Beyond the outfield fence is an airstrip. Planes, like cattle, stand in quiet groups. One can fly him to a big place—where can a science teacher lose himself?—Kansas City maybe, or St. Louis. Even the long stretches of wheat, of nine-inch corn look promising as sanctuaries. An escape from this dust fog, from the urges that brought him here last night. Odors rise again, this time imagined, but he sniffs his hands to make sure, brushes the bench, then sniffs again.
Batter up. The umpire crouches. On the mound, Randy pounds his mitt then looks over to the dugout. Dominick’s fingers, caught being sniffed, make quick fists. Randy screws up his face, as if to say, I don’t know that signal, Coach. His substitute players, kids he has to put in the game later, stand on the top step and start shouting the usual things. Thatsa way to fire. He wants a walk, wants a walk. Scorebook in hand, Dominick sits on the bench.
Dom, Teri laughed, the bench is too small—bending the last word, giving it another syllable almost, not the way an English teacher is supposed to sound. On his mind because of opening day, the dugout seemed a logical choice.
With a stubby pencil he blackens a diamond in the scorebook: one run. Randy looks nervous, his windup is stiff, he’s aiming the ball. Stop that shuffling, Sampson, you put grit in my teeth. It sounds too stern for opening day, so to be nice, he says: you replace Stark in the fifth, OK? After an inning, the other team, Fortin’s Supermarket, leads 1-0.
He needs to stretch his legs, loosen the nerves. Randy’s in trouble again. Two men on, a good excuse for a walk to the mound. Tingling, Dom’s knees ache. He emerges from the dugout, and when his eyes recover from the sudden glare, the crowd is right there, a bright, solid unit of T-shirts and caps behind the backstop. He looks down, crossing the foul line chalk. They stare, he imagines, examining every step, twitch, every moral atom. A mistake to come out, he’s on stage. But they know nothing. He hears the goat voice: Thatsa way Roy, you talk toom. Roy pops his catcher’s mask and saunters to the mound. A relief to have Roy here, too—takes a little eye-pressure off his back.
Dom, he’s tryin’ to throw too hard, Roy pants. Dom pushes some dirt with his foot. Settle down, Randy, he says, release the ball lower, push off from the rubber. Squinting, Randy rubs the baseball, adjusts his hat, nods.
The rubber. Dominick’s heart flips. But he must’ve taken it. He turns to look at the dugout—ridiculous because he can’t see inside from here but, turning, he faces the crowd, and now their colors swarm, blues and whites, hands waving at him: they know it’s there, know who used it. A motel would make me feel cheap, Teri whispered, holding him. No no, they’re fanning themselves. Caps flutter next to lolling red faces.
Settle down. Yeah, I know, Randy mumbles and Dominick realizes he’s said it out loud. He sees Ruth in the stands now, her arms held away from her sides, the way she looks when she’s hot, as if she’s trying to float. No hat to fan with, she rolls a beer can across her cheeks, smiles. Dom, she said last summer, let’s move east where it’s cooler, next to the sea. Better for a kid there anyway. Don’t push it, he tells Randy, just go easy.
Back across the chalk, calmer, he remembers picking it up (These things look silly, don’t you think? Teri said). In the dugout he doesn’t even check but looks across the corn and wheat. The distance—how far can he see?—draws him. If he and Ruth leave this town, Ruth would not have to know. I’m entitled, he thinks, to one mistake. He gulps from a jug of water. The heat, the summer came too quickly. No more teaching for a while, no more lunches with Teri. Far off, three hot air balloons dot the sky, another sign of June. Each summer Ruth gets a dreamy look when she sees the balloons, orange against blue, drift above the fields. Dom, she said once, if you had a balloon, where would you go?
Teri—her name whispered, the dugout’s first whisper probably—where do we go now?
No, Dom, we both have to get back, it’s late, we’ve each got someone waiting for us.
The substitutes start yelling again, Ran-dee, throw strikes.
I mean, Dominick said, still half-naked, what happens to us?
Come on, Ran-dee, zing it, zing it.
Oh, she said, pressed against him, her neck slippery with sweat, I don’t know. We’ve got two choices, I guess.
A smack, bubbles of dust at the plate, an arc of white near the fence. Silette circles under the ball, his glove up, mouth open, and makes the catch, third out. Down 3-0. The players tumble into the dugout, a clatter of gloves tossed, bats gathered. With each inning a tiny renewal. OK, Dominick says, let’s get some now. The order is Hewitt, Matson, Coles, got that? Give it a ride, Hew.
A ring of wetness lines his cap. His back is soaked, the shirt clings, his groin stirs. Your back is a river, Teri said, her hand under his shirt. But we should both be home.
He didn’t plan it, just suggested they find an empty place first near the river, but couples walked there. No one will be at the field, he said. In the car she took his arm. Dom, I’m not using anything right now. At McPherson’s Drugs he bought the package. Is that OK? Sure, she chuckled, but I feel like I’m back in high school. His fingers—dustless last night—crept across her belly. At least put your jacket down, she said. Gawd, this is crazy. Their jeans slipped off with quiet zips, her panties luminescent. Her breasts prettier than what he imagined behind her blouses at the faculty lounge, at the cafeteria. English embraces Science, she said. Kisses made little clicking sounds. He smelled her shampoo, then just her. Maybe we have to get this out of our systems, she whispered.
Hewitt’s on first—did he walk?—and the count’s 3 and 1 on Matson. Players move to the top step, expectations risen. Another ball and now Matson’s on, too. Coles shakes the weights off his bat and stalks to the plate. He goes through all the motions, things he probably saw on TV: spit on the hands, sprinkle dirt in the palms, put one foot in the box, make the pitcher wait. But he slams the first pitch, just clearing the fence, and Dom rises from the bench, lifted by that innate urge for winning. Cheers, like a breeze, seem to break the heat for a moment—he can hear Ruth’s voice and Coles, beaming, slaps hands as he jumps back down the steps. Thatsa way, we got ’em, Dominick says. Nice hit, Coles.
Tied at 3, Fortin’s Supermarket looks shaken, their pitcher worried: he walks two more. Dominick hears Ruth cheering again—maybe she has had a few beers. Gripping his bat, Silette asks, What’s the signal, Dom?
Bunt or steal, he thinks, looking at the field. Two choices, I guess, Teri said. Stop things now or we go somewhere far away.
Bunt the fucking ball, Silette. Jesus, look where the runners are, OK? Silette staggers back a little, hits his bat on the wall—Shit, OK Dom—then gets to the plate and drops a nice bunt. The pitcher scrambles, throws to third, and the umpire’s fist loops downward.
No no, Dominick yells, starting up the steps, he didn’t have his foot on the bag. The bag! He’s across the chalk, dust on his tongue. His neck prickles with heat. Then over to third, close to the ump: What were you watching? His foot was this far, my God.
Hey, the ump explains, the ball got there—
Dominick stomps. No, his foot wasn’t on the bag, can’t you see?
Dom, I saw it and he was out. The ump separates his legs, crosses his arms over his blue uniform.
You’re crazy crazy crazy. Dom waves his arms, he tries to see Ruth in the crowd, his chest nears explosion. I saw it, he was safe, safe, make me safe.
Dom, I ain’t never thrown someone out of a game, but—
Kick me out, kick the hell out of me.
Just go back now, Dom.
I’m sorry, I’m sorry for it. Shaking, Dominick starts toward the other dugout, realizes it’s the wrong one, and stops. Now he sees Ruth near the concession stand holding an ice cream bar. She angles her h
ead and lifts her shoulders, a long shrug.
Dominick comes back down the steps and Sampson, leaning on a bat, says, Well, it was a close call, do I go in now? Yeah, Dom mumbles, next inning. Dominick stands in the corner, away from the substitutes. He feels dizzy and dissolved, as if he’s now part of the thick air and dust. Every so often he sips from the water jug to keep himself from falling. If we could just go to another country, Teri, stop the clocks for a while, get this out of our systems.
When his team wins (3, a rally started by Roy), Dominick is relieved rather than excited. The players slap palms, bang fists, and swear with exuberance. He gathers the equipment into the bag, stuffing bats, plopping balls. He hauls it up to the gate. The crowd is gone, the field bare except for a man raking the dirt. One of the planes on the airstrip buzzes, then taxis slowly down the narrow runway.
Dominick, you won. Ruth hurries toward him, a bouncy step, takes his cap and pushes it over her hair. Did you see the balloons?
