Lioness Poem by Deborah DeNicola

Not a cat, not a leopard, a lioness
walks out of my eye, halts on furred paws.
that cover her claws. Her head, turning, her orange
mane hangs like drapery and when she opens
her jaws, I fall into darkness and close quarters.
Ripening fullness inside her mouth. Her musk
weighted as cloud, like the misty refusal of rain.
She licks my chin and my whole head heaves
in the height of her throat. Heat ticks somewhere
below baseboards. And the hands of the dream
hold me entranced in its print like a pinned insect
under amber, brutal shelter, almost beneficent—
something like—love.