Cinnamon Peeler by Michael Ondaatje

If I were a cinnamon peeler
I would ride your bed
and leave the yellow bark dust on your pillow.


......... this is how you touch other women
the grasscutter's wife, the lime burner's daughter.
And you searched your arms
for the missing perfume.

and knew

what good is it
to be the lime burner's daughter
left with no trace
as if not spoken to in an act of love
as if wounded without the pleasure of scar.

You touched
your belly to my hands
in the dry air and said
I am the cinnamon
peeler's wife. Smell me.