my heart is a ravenous beast

it’s sleeping now, softly snoring
sound the only reminder
something still lives within me

it hungers still
but has forgotten how to bite
how to chew, how to swallow
maybe it never knew

its teeth ache when i dare to bite
the taste of affection so unfamiliar
i spit it back out and the beast,
it moves away

pressed against the back of the cage
here it cannot be reached
here it safe from the strangeness
of feeling full