Coconut
Four times they drew,
checking blood
for sweetness—how quickly
the body can dissolve
what feeds it. “Glucose”
meaning sweet wine,
simple, meaning
how much of it hides
inside the coconut’s
husk, its tender white-
meat flesh, its milk,
the creamy-clear
colostrum, the same
as your seed-nut-fruit
dark-drupe nipples seep
each time you shower
or mistake a noise
for children’s crying.
You vomited the first time,
five-years-old and biting
its shredded meat, dried flakes
surrounded by dark chocolate.
You feel it even now, sand
between your teeth, sickness
rising, remembering
BOUNTY, the candy-bar
treat so you’d endure another
hour in the market, Ukraine’s
summer heat, your bountiless
childhood, everything
for sale to make departure
sweeter. You’ve refused it
since, the stick and sweet
of it. You’ve let go
anything you own,
your blood and choice
to eat a bountiful pint
of imported German
ice cream, impossible
in your insoluble childhood.
by Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach
from Muzzle Magazine