Instead of Talking About My Assault, My Lover Peels an Orange

By: Hunter Hazelton

Does he blame the orange

for its unpeeling? There’s no scream

as he thumbs the thing. The orange

receives what’s not asked for like a good victim.

It perspires—sweaty & citric,

spilling its guts upon

my lover’s lips. Devoured.

Then there’s me, voyeur,

transfixed by his: cocked head—

open the great throat of Cronus.

Almost pornographic. Common violence.

His nails impale skin,

unwelcoming as daybreak.

He leaves the carcass atop the duvet.

What a banal death, that little peel.

I, too, hollow and homeless

as any wounded fruit,

pull down the covers

& show it my empathy–blued &

bruised–I am ready.

I’ll dispose of the death & shower

for the first time.

But only

when I am ready.

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Hunter Hazelton is the author of the chapbook “I Never Understood Religion Until I Learned Your Name” (2021). Writing from the age of six, his poems have appeared in Best New Poets, Scribendi Magazine, and Tolsun Books. Currently, he teaches in Phoenix, Arizona.