Yeast

A word you can’t quite say
without itching, flinching; it’s not easy
to ignore its squirming appetite, stay
your primal juddering. And yes, at
night, each microbe gurns in the salty sea
of gut and gullet, born again, boldly eats
as you ate it, brews its own queasy tea
of proto-raunch which it will quickly sate,
birthing wanderlusting vigors, as yet
unknown to microscience. They sashay, set
out for the toes or gape through your eyes at
your drooping lids, your fat bunch of keys, at
this internal motel’s boss, bellhop, lackey, sat
in the throne of his slumber, a mercy seat. 

By Roddy Lumsden
Source: Poetry. Vol. 198, No. 1 (April 2011), p. 13

Pakui Hardware, The Return of Sweetness (Glass object, heat-treated PVC, textile fabric, latex, silicone, chia seeds, cables), Exhibition views, 2018
Photo © Filippo M. Nicoletti. Courtesy L'Ascensore