Sweet Shop

By Tara Gira

A wide-open door,

Underneath, its candy red and white signage

Might seem welcoming at first,

Until that restlessness stirs everything inside me so quickly, I cease to think.

Everything moves in me,

But my legs.

God forbid I don’t blend in with the rest of the starry-eyed consumers-

Vultures-

Stepping to the calm pace of their false hunger.

My irises bounce between the couple thousand sweets,

And kaleidoscopic vending machines.

I’m looking for something-

It’s so specific.

Something to soothe the raucous rumble surging through my gut,

And seal the gaping black hole 

Laying waste to my heart.

My favourite thing will do just that.

But it doesn’t seem to rest amongst the provocative display of excess red and yellow forty,

Or the shortbread,

Or the toffee.

They egg me on to look for what I like second-best,

Or simply something else.

Which might even prove sweeter, richer,

Than my favourite.

So easily within my reach-

But I ignore them.

I must find it-

Because I’m starting to resent the taste of my bottom lip,

And the inside of my cheek.

Little laughs and crinkling plastic-

I look behind me to see them.

Two customers. Both satisfied.

She’s acquired her favourite- chocolate.

And he has his favourite too- blueberry.

One moment they giggle into a nibble.

The next,

They sigh into a bite.

And sometimes-

They just stare at the morsels in their palms,

Wishing they could devour them whole.

My fingers twitch around nothingness.

So many nights drift by,

Where I can almost feel

The buttery weight shifting over the tips of my fingers,

And taste it

On the tip of my tongue.

Only to wake up to the wishful sensations

Evaporating from my tongue.

What I want,

Is simple.

By Tara Gira