10/31/12

The Bone in His Chest
By Jennifer Maritza McCauley


He is slender; I remember his bones. I set my sleep to the image of his stretching tarsals, his snapping patellas, the shiver of his cavernous ilium. How many bones, how many bones can I count…
I see the spaces between his clavicle, little dried-up tarns for the tongue to take a dip. I see his manly mandible, the arc of his cranium; the heavy, heaving ribs. I stroke that skull, lick the cockleshell that protects his forebrain. He doesn’t realize how lovely his bones are; he’s that sort of man. He gathers them up when he stands; he carries them lightly.
I’ve claimed the bone in his chest. It is my protrusion, brown-rose and crooked like an elbow, centered at the highest part of his sternum. I rub that knob, sketch circles around it with my nail. I believe only he can possess that bone because I’ve kissed it today, yesterday, Sunday.
His bones are a blessing; I want to carry them lightly.


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Jennifer Maritza McCauley is a freelance writer and graduate of the University of Pittsburgh. Presently she resides in Miami, Florida and is working toward her MFA as a Knight Fellow at Florida International University. She has upcoming work appearing in First Inkling Magazine, amongst other journals.