Or maybe just one is enough
One big, juicy orange 
if you savour sucking
if you take your time with each slice 
I use orange as a metaphor here 
because we’re in a trade war with the US 
and so the California fruit
and its extra cost, is on my mind, but also 
I’m aware, now in my thirties
of the added cost of intimacy 
I would like to write a love poem, I really would 
but I’m stuck at intimacy, the juice 
underneath the rind
Love only happens when the orange is devoured 
and there’s nothing left, but your memory 
of that one orange which stands out more than all the other oranges you’ve eaten
and it takes form in the belly
Love always begins in the belly, I know
because that’s where I felt her 
even before she kicked 
that’s where I feel all the aftereffects 
of love-making 
just below the belly button, along the scar
not the scar where the flesh has healed over
but the bigger one, on the inside 
the one that pushes against intimacy 
until love takes hold and spreads to the rest of your body, right down to your fingertips 
so when you brush a strand of hair behind my ear, I can feel it 
without you even having to say a word
I feel it in my gut