Amicale

This March 23, let yourself be carried away by Erica Jong's poetic eruption, with her work shared by Aikaterini LAZANA from the Amicale poetry club.

 

Erica Jong

Climbing You

I want to understand the steep thing

that climbs ladders in your throat.

I can't make sense of you.

 

Everywhere I look you're there--

a vast landmark, a volcano

poking its head through the clouds,

Gulliver sprawled across Lilliput.
 

I climb into your eyes, looking.

The pupils are black painted stage flats.

They can be pulled down like window shades.

I switch on a light in your iris.

Your brain ticks like a bomb.
 

In your offhand, mocking way

you've invited me into your chest.
 

Inside: the blur that poses as your heart.
 

I'm supposed to go in with a torch

or maybe hot water bottles

& defrost it by hand

as one defrosts an old refrigerator.
It will shudder & sigh

(the icebox to the insomniac).
 

Oh there's nothing like love between us.
 

You're the mountain, I am climbing you.
 

If I fall, you won't be all to blame,

but you'll wait years maybe

for the next doomed expedition.

 

Shared by Aikaterini LAZAN