I admit: the cup, the bend, the skin
where your shoulder and neck met
fitted my temple and my eye.
Your blood warmed my ocular bone,
my thighs still cold with sea-foam.
I slept in the smell of you—
forge and fire in your beard,
soot and cypress smoke on your hands.
You would jiggle your foot—
the clubbed one closed like a fist—
to the anvil’s song still ringing
through your body,
a song I could never hear.
Cast wide your net, my dear.
Tangle me up in your traces.
It’s a pity to pity your husband.
Annie Woodford
Annie Woodford is a teacher and poet living in Roanoke, Virginia. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Appalachian Heritage, The Comstock Review, Word Riot, The Normal School, The Chattahoochee Review, Waccamaw, Bluestem, Tar River Poetry, and Town Creek Poetry, among others.
Artwork: Chie Yoshii, “Orpheus”
Website: http://www.chieyoshii.com/
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