Vulgar Tenderness

February 9, 2025

Clinging to the cloying, syrupy dregs

Sweetness nearly overripe

Teeth sink eagerly into

Yielding flesh

Tender

breathing

Brightly, fiercely, visibly

Knowing that, otherwise

Tolls the knell

What seems an inevitable

culling

Or, to believe them

reckoning

My babies

The best people

I have ever known

I do not want to

lose them

be part of

Where they are not welcome

However and whoever

They may be

I want them to grow up

Knowing the truth

Of  me

themselves

Not vile, twisted, immoral

I continue to hope

Possible

in

the circumstances

spite of them

I want

to spend more time

Living

Growing up

I want them

to grow up