OCTAVIA
I read your story
virginal, in all innocence,
no idea
what damage it
would do me
thing slithering upon me
you should have warned me
such things
in your head co- exist
beauty, horror, sensuousness,
outright repulsion
and revulsion
got me thinking seriously
about what I do with words
revising
every precept and
then some
we do become enslaved
forever fighting that losing battle
from time
in the jungle until
we touch the stars
I had my
own ambivalent encounters
with such a parasitic demon
a special creature and
she
knew it too
buzzing me staring into my
eyes to compound
the picture
had to talk to AI to figure
out what it could be
the nature
of the attraction, what
we might
have possibly shared
and the rear-end of your
tapered wasp frame
there a
no-nonsense sting, venom
object to be
reckoned with
guess when we ourselves
straddle the boundaries
between
deepest horror and
scientific imagination
your visit
about to make a point
jolt
of inspiration
Ms Butler’s friendly forbidding
Tlic Queen (for
Queen
she seems)
not light years away (or if
indeed so,
space we should cross
if pleased
to meet her).
poems 2 die for 