tender

as in falling off the bone / into your lap
bent over itself like a daffodil in winter
new & easily bruised / or given
over like currency / a wee piece of chatter
hardly registers / dainty is nice in paintings
but it needs a corset to sit upright
stay off it / apply ice until no longer /
as in one who attends so he doesn’t have to
or two tiny lumps of brain sugar / a wild
sunflower to be pressed into the most
soluble of petals / marzipan kept on high
shelf because breakable / rose fully blown
and dusted with glitter / as the silence left
after the explosion that makes a nova

Jill Khoury writes about gender, disability, and embodied identity. She has two chapbooks and a full-length collection published with Sundress in 2016.