Affection
It’s not just your
plaintive cry
from the mezzanine
during the second act,
your cough
that echoes through the hall
or the way your chair creaks
when you fidget
It’s the sibilance
of your whisper in my ear,
the soft words
you exhale
that I can barely make out,
how you glance at me
and occasionally
rest your hand on my arm
The anticipated embrace
when we sit so close,
the way
you greet others
with honest affection,
how music makes us one.
here
we cast one shadow
on the sand as we laugh
and stumble
into a tide pool
jellyfish graze our legs
but don’t sting
we’re not as transparent
as they are yet we can
sting one another
even as we love
Jonathan K. Rice edited Iodine Poetry Journal for seventeen years. He is the author of two full-length poetry collections, Killing Time (2015), Ukulele and Other Poems (2006) and a chapbook, Shooting Pool with a Cellist (2003), all published by Main Street Rag Publishing. He is also a visual artist. His work has appeared most recently in Foliate Oak, Mad Swirl, The Main Street Rag, South Florida Poetry Journal and forthcoming in As It Ought To Be, First Literary Review-East, Rye Whiskey Review and San Pedro River Review.
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