Friday Poem: "O Full of Scorpions"

This poem's title alludes to Macbeth's line that concludes, "...is my mind, dear wife." When I was a kid, I seemed to absorb all kinds of strange advice when I was in the Boy Scouts. One rule we had when camping was to always check your shoes for scorpions before you put them on in the morning—despite, of course, living and camping in Germantown, Maryland, where we were more likely to be abducted by the Blair Witch than to be stung to death by a scorpion.

O Full of Scorpions

The poison hook stark in the mind,
Its curve like a clean cerebral fold; 
A needle pulsing with chemical heat,
Poised on the tip of a beckoning finger;
A single black fang, a venom jet;
The tail of the bold embossed comma
That hangs between the parentheses
Of uncertainty and disaster—
the sinister claw and the dexterous,
open and shut.  It’s Lucifer’s teardrop,
Trembling like an embryo; a fine trigger
Itching to puncture.  The stylus
That dips briefly into your scarlet ink,
Drawing out a single blot of panic.
Its shape: the lobe that houses the jitters,
That pauses your hands as you thumb open
The mouth of your boot, unable
To illuminate beyond the dark angles
Of your intentions, or what might lurk there.

This poem appeared in Ceriph No. 3.