Chocolate

They came in a cheap box,

thin plastic band posturing as ribbon,

cheap gold lettering on the brittle cover

that cracked with our first touch.

Chocolates from Belgium curved

into shell-etched creatures

swirled brown and white, caught

and waiting in their plastic beds,

waiting like sin waits

for that first turning.

Melted from the heat

of our hand, smeared

across the whorled tip of finger,

we took them slowly

like wine.

As thick and heavy with pleasure

as the secret, we never spoke

but practiced all the same,

they spread over our tongue,

filling our mouth like comfort,

dark and whole.