Riddle #12

June 10th, 1985 at 6:24 pm by Rastaban (Poetry, Riddles)

All life-long I have been lover to fire.
Nothing I like better
than my back straight to the heat,
hat off, mouth wide open,
staring up, gulping down to the full
your unintended gifts of food.

My genitals lay exposed before you,
you who must handle me freely.
Unclothed, my quivering penis
stands in life-long hard-on.
You don’t seem to notice — suddenly
down comes your hand. You pull me about
by this like a handle:
you never hesitate.

Sexless you call me
but into my lipped interior insert
your precious fluids.
The meat of your life, the bread,
these are my nourishment. Digested,
unused, I regurgitate
them up again, to the delight of your hearty appetite.

You call me strange one,
almost all head, you say.
You peer into my wide mouth,
you dentist searching for cavities
in a toothless hollow.
You inspect my very insides
till I have no secrets. You plumb me,
then you put on my hat; my mouth is closed.

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Riddle #5

June 10th, 1985 at 6:21 pm by Rastaban (Featured Poems, Poetry, Riddles)

What kind of songbird am I, anyway?
I, who have never sat in a tree
or pecked at the bark of a pine.
I, who have never nested in forest
or flown with the wind, smelling the excitement
of a flock of birds on wing.

—Why dream? I couldn’t fly anyway.
I am a captive of man.

Man
who granted me a voice
only to deny me a song of my own.
Who bids me to sing at his pleasure
running me around
until I think I must finally run out of breath.
Until I wish I could die.
Man
he put me in a rut and left me there.
And I can’t escape.

I’m not even caged.

I must be one of Hugo’s miserables.
I am a songbird,
but there is no song in my heart.

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