Harvest

You slide through steam and softly hum among
the hiss of boiling, bite and purse your lips
over a stew of scents, your hands at whisks
and spoons, a sullied blouse. Your slender hips

cock at engaging angles, bones in cotton
knob sharply; fabric shows what it conceals:
covers your bottom like an oil, and thins
to nearly nothing when you bend, reveals

a tender absence in the midst of plenty,
the shadow of a furrow fine but fallow;
a vessel prized the more for being empty,
cup more coveted for being hollow.