A Sex Shop Named Desire

by Sophie E. Eikli

Choose how I can love you by our own design,
walking through the alleys marked by silicone.

The serpents, the cylinders, the questing hands,
all of these things my natural body cannot provide,
but if you’d like, we could stop
by the sweets aisle
or the fabrics,
where the rubber hugs the mannequin
reflecting your shyness,
and mine.

When we walk to the counter,
to the person who is nearly like us,
they will not smile or try
to make a joke of this.
As they do not raise
their coloured eyebrow
they will be genuine,
will shoulder our mirrored fear.

Afterwards, we will walk to the station
with a hope in our consecrated bags
and a fear that everyone will know
the journey we took to get here.
But we have known worse demons
than the grandmother who eyes our hands,
which have always been ambitious
in the evenings.

When we get to your door 
you will giggle at last,
a confession if I ever heard it
muffled in the turning lock,
your eyes trained on the wood of the door.


When we finally break
over the threshold.
When we finally break
the promises we made
to our bodies.
When we finally turn beneath the blinds,
and you offer me your secret, opening smile.

Then, everything will have its start.

This poem is featured in the zine “Femmedyke: and other works pertaining to the lesbian experience. It appears alongside works by all sorts of lesbians of colour, trans lesbians, he/him lesbians, and more. It can be pre-ordered here, as well as the original version of this poem appearing on their Instagram.