New Poetry by Don Benson

Strangers being annoyingly intimate in the car behind me 

If I starved this animal of love

Or starved it of oxygen

How would it react?

Is it the same thing?

That couple behind me

Look much less important than this

Her touching his hair

A loose arm across her shoulders

Another flattened palm against his stomach

A primitive test to see if we pretend not to care

About the possibility of affection

But no

I can’t give you a lift

No space on the back of this bus

Just roll over

Play dead

Pray for a little death

Where the only way to be loved

Is to never ask for love

A blind mole rat's love

Have you ever been bitten

Hard enough to still feel it

when you wake up?

I'll wait and see

If you touch me

And if you do

I will touch you too