James B. Nicola
A Gift of Restraint
I have a special gift for you. You see
these lips, these lips of mine? Now they are yours.
Do with them what you will, or nothing. They
are yours to command as you wish while we
are here together. That means they won't do
a single thing you do not want them to.
This way you can relax. These hands, this heart—
my eyes and mind too—are still mine and may
yet misbehave a little. If you feel
the back of your neck grabbed and wonder why
or how, it will be one of them, most likely,
wanting to pull you closer to these lips.
But since these lips are yours now, should they meet
your other lips, it will be all your doing.
Bio
James B. Nicola is a frequent contributor to Shot Glass. The latest of his eight full-length poetry collections is Natural Tendencies. His nonfiction book Playing the Audience won a Choice magazine award. A graduate of Yale, he has received a Dana Literary Award, two Willow Review awards, Storyteller's People's Choice award, one Best Microfiction, one Best of Net, one Rhysling, and eleven Pushcart nominations-for which he feels both stunned and grateful.