ours by not beings ours

Photo by dbking via flickr

Ours by not being ours.

Saturday mornings with the guys

he’d tell bed-sheet war stories.

I’d ask something like how’d she taste anyway

and we’d crack all into fits

like brunch comrades or brothers.

Picking her up, he’d take me — all pithy chest

and split knees — and she’d wonder

who’s side I was on, I’m sure. I’d tell racist jokes and he’d snort

hard at me with his eyes

on her like something wild.

Later crowded in a drunken doorway: he’d find

the crook of my belly hiding

under my breasts and slip his fingers over the trigger

like he’d known all along

that I too was an enemy.