"You’re Not One, But Many" by Mary Christine Delea

You’re Not One, But Many

Because I made you that way.
All of you.
I have turned my hand into one finger and my mood determines
which finger.

Fire for heat, mouth for the places smoke cannot find.

You are the only one forever

I told each of you.
I meant it. I still do.

The gloom of jobs that were never what you wanted them
to be. Nothing but secrets and deception.
Noise from the racetrack. Wolves in the rain,
the early winter snow, the late summer wildfires.

I’d stroke your face into fur, blush at your howling,
laugh when you growled. History teaches us that women

and wolves are an unnatural match. I held out my fingers
each time. Each time
I got bit.

Mary Christine Delea

Mary Christine Delea has a PhD in English/Creative Writing and is a former university professor. She is the author of one full-length poetry collection and three chapbooks. Her web site (mchristinedelea.com) includes a blog where she posts writing prompts on Sundays and poems by others on Sundays and Wednesdays. She is learning Irish and recently quit Twitter.

Headshot: Mary Christine Delea

Photo Credit: Staff