I have been wondering for years about the spoon
Its graceful feeling and its warmth
Its promises of shelter instinctively cuddling up
In primitive blankets made of human skin.
Though the merciless hunter does not kill its prey
It deviously treats it kindly to use its leather as it deems.
The prey ignoring the deception and its fate
Is convinced the spoon is its spontaneous act of love.
Unguarded I would be inclined to agree
Contemplating embedded hot bodies
Two pieces of a jigsaw lying in bed.
Nothing wrong with it yet,
The unconditional abundance of the prey’s generosity
Compels my scepticism to investigate. Pathetic defence
Of a cautious hunter who thinks again. I ponder
Sanguinely perhaps a primeval instinct of protection
Leads the strongest to spoon the frailest guard delicacy,
A lie, as I mentally retrace encounters of the past
I notice physical strength is not in the dock,
For I have been the one enwrapping and the one enwrapped.
A perplexing conclusion proposes my sole sentence
Discerning the inequity of the affair, elevating myself
From investigator to judge I rule,
‘Those who are loved the most receive’.
And there is always someone who loves more
Someone who loves less. A bad deal,
With a fraudulent lover who selfishly accepts
To be the recipient never the giver. I say,
Better by far to be the one who loves immensely
Than to be the one who shamefully feels the guilt
Of consenting to be loved more, than it can ever love in return.
[Featured painting: Early Morning Spooning by Charles M Williams]