We used to hold hands, a quiver
along the skin
at touch,                     do you remember?

You handled me like I was food,
to be prepared pealed back,
to find the taste within.

I was advised not to- but I had hungered,
had grown ill                      without.

A cold cut cannot survive without the fold

of the fridge.

Or were you the oil and I                     the onion?
Having already been cut,

sliced before being found. Remember?

But we’d been spared                     the tears.
We tasted of a thousand nights
that had never known                     any stars

and then we wanted to taste                     it all.

Do you remember? No,
you don’t.                        I forgot.

We only held hands in my head
in that room I shared

with the one                     I shared the tears with.

Still slicing.

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly