17th Annual SCWC*SD

Topic Award Winner

Each year the SCWC*SD has a writing contest in which all conferees are invited to participate. The rules are simple: Write a piece in any form you wish of no more than 250 words based on the topic announced Friday night. The topic for the 17th annual conference was "Lap". Shubha Venugopal of Bethlehem, PA is one of two writers awarded for outstanding entries.


LAP

by

Shubha Venugopal

.

To do you, I open my mouth wide. My tongue
Rolls forward, curls, and slides inside.
In scooping fluid it is sinuous—
It slips back, flicks lips,
Swallows, and is satisfied.

To do you now requires no mere glide of tongue inside.

Now, my body, trapped in fluid force, fights
To finish endless counts of you.
In liquid circles, round and round,
I stretch and kick and spin.
And why? Why just to say
I completed you.

And then, exhausted, to you I crawl.

And when I reach to touch,
My fingers dimple skin.
I push on you, you give—
So I believe in you.
Soothed, I pull myself on top.
Cradled by a nest of bones and soft of flesh,
I relax and melt to you.
Engulfed by you, I prepare to sleep. . .

There is a jerk . . .a shock . . . and soft turns taut.
You straighten . . . and you are gone.

Alone I think of you.

The end.

Copyright 2003, Shubha Venugopal. Used with permission.


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