Anne Cecelia Holmes

RED AFFECTION

Think of me as the animal
in the camera most
likely to stand frozen.
An intimate moment
no matter if you
look away. I believe
there are particles
in us not suitable
for big nature.
What I really am
is already skinned
and flushed and when
I wrap my arms around
you something in them
screams. I have been
watching myself
for so long to make sure
I am still intact. This
season is open season.
I love the woods
as much as the next
person but now I am
begging to stay inside.

Anne Cecelia Holmes is the author of a chapbook, Junk Parade (dancing girl press), and co-author with Lily Ladewig of the e-chapbook I Am A Natural Wonder (Blue Hour Press). Her first full-length book, The Jitters, is forthcoming from horse less press in 2015, and her poems have been published or are forthcoming in jubilat, Conduit, Whiskey Island, Sink Review, The New Megaphone, Denver Quarterly, Sixth Finch, and some other places. She lives in Western Massachusetts.

Image courtesy of Anton Novoselov.