Ramshackle Review

Jennifer Wineke:
Three Poems

how to eat a grapefruit

in the passenger seat sitting
cross-legged. take a bite
to make a tear and then unravel
slowly, carefully, make sure
to keep it all in one piece round
and full so you can use it as
a bowl for the thick white skin
you’ve got to use your fingernails
really dig into it try to get it all
tender-bare, smooth and delicate
stick your thumb in it, pry the rosy
pink in half  and make your choice,
peel off the plumpest little juice pillow

and then
when he is speaking his most
passionately

stuff it—hard
into his mouth
so that he cries
out and lets go
of the wheel to
catch the liquid running
down his chin and sticking
to his fingers and the smell
he can’t wash off and though
he’ll make a fuss,
he loves it,
you can
be sure
of that. 

remember that time

you leaned
over the couch
to give me
a kiss from
behind as I
was eating my
ice cream and right
when your lips
warm and soft
met my sloppy
mouth
the spoon
jabbed
quick--
into
your
ear
cold and metal,
well,
I did that
on purpose.
I’m sorry it’s just
I get a kick
out of
hearing
you
yelp.

ladybugs

our love motif. flickering like half moons
above our tangled bodies in the park,
landed on my blue-jeaned thigh, you picked one
from my hair. peering slyly from their seats
along the telephone pole as we dug
up the ring, notebooks, you and your shovel
and me in your hat but my boots. and then,
finally, resting on bayou lampshades,
drinking beers in cabins with sam cooke. on
the drive home i found one on your collar.

Jennifer Wineke grew up in Louisiana, was educated in California, and currently lives in Prague, where she works as a copywriter. For more of her poetry, please visit her website.