Lynne Burnett
The Geography of Desire
Yes, there were nods of male approval when a friend at fifty
(after twenty years of marriage) went under the knife
to pump up her “girls”, thinking what she had was not enough,
busting out of the buttons of a shirt now to say so.
But when another at fifty-three had to divide her pair,
losing a breast so quietly only her husband knew
for months, the same heads shook for him,
hoping this never happened to them.
Take a breast from its pedestal like that and a frantic
mind ties the faithful heart to a railroad track and
doesn’t look back. Like in those old silent movies
we need a hero here and soon—one hand perhaps
doming the sudden plain, the other cupping the
high rise of the breast that’s left, mouth braving
a startled nipple, the salt of saliva or sweat or tears
busying his tongue. Butterfly kiss to the missing one.
(after twenty years of marriage) went under the knife
to pump up her “girls”, thinking what she had was not enough,
busting out of the buttons of a shirt now to say so.
But when another at fifty-three had to divide her pair,
losing a breast so quietly only her husband knew
for months, the same heads shook for him,
hoping this never happened to them.
Take a breast from its pedestal like that and a frantic
mind ties the faithful heart to a railroad track and
doesn’t look back. Like in those old silent movies
we need a hero here and soon—one hand perhaps
doming the sudden plain, the other cupping the
high rise of the breast that’s left, mouth braving
a startled nipple, the salt of saliva or sweat or tears
busying his tongue. Butterfly kiss to the missing one.
Biography
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Lynne Burnett lives in the Pacific Northwest. Recent publications include Arc, Blue Heron Review, Comstock Review, IthacaLit, Mockingheart Review, New Millennium Writings, Ristau, River Styx, Tamsen, Taos Journal of Poetry & Art, and a number of anthologies. She is the 2016 winner of the Lauren K. Alleyne Difficult Fruit Poetry Prize, has been nominated for Best of the Net and was shortlisted for Arc’s 2018 Poem of the Year. Finishing Line Press published her chapbook, “Irresistible” in April, 2018. She maintains a blog/website at https://lynneburnett.ca/
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