Holly Thompson-IV

Mid-Afternoon Tea   

 

after the pound cake

with strawberries

mikan oranges

and caramel Fauchon tea

she shows us the centipede

air-lifted from the floor

with a pair of chopsticks

and placed in a jam jar

of shochu where it floats—

sea serpent in spirits

now soaked with poison

 

so that when

a live centipede

S-tracks across

her leg or wrist or neck

when she is sleeping

as it will

one night

in a house like this

in the country

and bites

 

she is ready

with the antidote