Brine

Salted sharp and bitter
as fishbones fragrant
leached and bleached
at the stock pot bottom
I am a taste acquired
as the night jet ink
of a venomous squid.
Burst bright on the ceiling
of a mouth concealing
displeasure with a smile
like the curved arm
of an octopus. Reach
across a crowded table
to heap my tender body
from the platter, claw
cracked as a man’s
rib to make a weakness.
Oil glistens on a clean
white plate. Smear
butter on my best flesh
to leave a smile stained,
shards of hardened shells
gathering at your feet.

Sarah Fawn Montgomery is the author of Halfway from Home (Split/Lip Press, 2022), Quite Mad: An American Pharma Memoir (The Ohio State University Press, 2018) and three poetry chapbooks. Nerve, a craft book on unlearning the ableist workshop and developing a disabled writing practice, is forthcoming with Sundress Publications, and Abbreviate, a short collection of flash nonfiction, is forthcoming with Harbor Editions. She is an Associate Professor at Bridgewater State University.