After John Donne’s "To His Mistress Going to Bed"

What might she send — a wet sleeve,
or platter of brine-latticed bluefish

dusky with capers, lemons, wine;
a briar for your thumb, a mouth,

lunatic,  to suck the blood:
a signal that one too often

inside & now beside herself with thoughts
of you wonders how she might woo

and through dew-whetted keyhole
pursue & sing & win?   She is marvelous

with waiting.  Come.  Hunt here.
Relieve with hands and tongue her heavy hour.

By Lisa Russ Spaar
Recipient of the 2011 Carole Weinstein Poetry Prize

Reprinted by permission of Persea Books
from Satin Cash by Lisa Russ Spaar.
Copyright © 2008 by Lisa Russ Spaar.