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Dermatophagia

I’ve been eating the skin off my hands

for as long as I can remember;
all-purpose tools, obedient pets,

hot and shining when I unwrap them
I dip my tongue into the new pink

pool of skin my teeth left behind, smooth,
fresh; fingerprint broken, I could be

unknowable, though I know better
than ever now the world flows through this

new window of my body; white waves
rise where the skin courses to grow back

thicker, strong as a heavy oak door
But my front teeth swing it open

and I swallow it off its hinges.
You can stop looking at me

like I’m a freak. Imagine
your body uncontained: its paper

torn, a dahlia blooms on each wrist
your heat pouring out into the air

On one hand, the protection is nice:
Picturesque; you press your soft girl’s hand

to your girlfriend’s neck and make her a sky
over the ridges of fingertips.

But on the other, a red sea gleaming
palm eats your lover whole, and dissolves you too;

Imagine the whole girl turned inside out
from fingertip to stomach, expanding.