Talking

Since when has speech become akin to sex?

All accountability falls out, lifeless, writhing

On the floor in a snake’s pattern.

I do not simply speak to you, I fuck you in the

Backseat of a car, under the glow of a TV,

When your parents aren’t home.

Yet to you, I merely speak.

This word invalidates all emotions, places a thin

Screen of fragile masculine plastic between us

And curtails all hope of connection.

How can you expect to have a genuine

Relationship if you hold others at arm’s length,

Summing up every action, every touch, every

Experience into a single word? Talking.

We “talk,” but you do not listen.