First, I had had a thought so unnerving
I went cold all over, in the heat. What if I
love this man, whom I hardly know,
more than I’ve loved any other man, and at
once I was a water fountain,
at grammar school, in the hall, a bubbler,
I was bubblering, I had turned into
a water-bearer who couldn’t bear but
blubbered her water with gulpy blubbers
on a hot summer day. Years ago,
I had been a sudden desert fountain
most days, at old love’s fresh sudden end.
And now, here I am, again,
but not in my cherryskin armor, again,
not with my cherry bow and juice-tipped
arrows and dried cherry jerkin
and quiver, and cherry scenthound—not that
aging cherry Artemis again, it feels
different, now, with this humorous curious
man, I feel as if we may be
the distilled fruit, the liquor itself, as if I’m
in the interior of new love’s
mouth, I am safe, under his tongue.
And under my own tongue, look
who you see—look!, perfectly safe, it is he.
—Sharon Olds
Sharon Olds teaches poetry in the MFA creative writing program at NYU.
