How To Catch A Man*

thefrenemy:

Sit quietly with your legs crossed.

Your lips are red! (like rose, the fingers that pricked themselves, Le Creuset Cookware, raw meat)
Eyes round & black, smile slight & suspicious.
The points on your face meet sharp ends: eyebrows, those spider lashes, and the nose.

Better to smell you with, you say, like the wolf in the nightgown.
You are wearing something that shows off your thigh.

Smell of jasmine and something smoky or spicy or the old, musty furs in the attic.
Musk?
You shake your head.
No: Tuberose. Sea Salt. Sweat. Firewood. Down Pillows. Iron. Things you were born to.

Flash of teeth, “Did you go to school on the East Coast?”
Place a napkin on your lap, carve out hearts and eat with the smallest fork on the left.
Read Miss Manners and wipe the pages on the corners of your mouth.
Find a man, quickly, throwing the scraps to dogs!

You have begun to confuse love with power, and you find both delicious.

Look at him like you will take him to bed, like your mouth is full of poison, like you seek cauldrons..
The clock ticking inside of you is a bomb.

“Women are weak”—your teeth are made of bone, your skull comes with a crown.
Underneath the soft flesh lies mettle
Like the lion, like the mountain:
You cannot shrink.

“Be Seen and Not Heard,” you have become the heavy smoke that chokes in the fire.
You walk quiet streets, looking behind you each step until you become the fearless shadow.
You are the loudest you’ve ever been, voice like earthquake and siren and fierce laughter.

But o, what soft skin.

Arch your back where the wings might sprout.
Come closer,

*Eat Him Whole.