From the Fishouse

The peach was perfect, vulva-clefted, never been refrigerated, fragrant in blush

She had been saving it for breakfast, imagining the burst when she bit in

A company of soldiers, breakfasted on rations, helmeted and shielded, gusseted with canisters and rifle-
slung, arrived by dark

Ringing the village. The unassailable perfection of the ring

Sunrise brushed the dust and turned sleep inside out

Their noose of words: Curfew, closed zone

She’d been about to bite

Pots, water tanks clanged outrage from the rooftops

The peach in her hand, hot, soft...

Flung through the air at a boy soldier

She, radiant. He, as if his mother had slapped him