Ghost Pepper

Bartenders offer ghost pepper

chips with beer because the kick

of each crisp demands another drink

to quiet, not silence

the snarl of spice on the tongue,

the way a kiss quenches desire just enough

to require another kiss, then more.

At sunset, sleep is far off

yet those who sleep are close

and breathing down my ear

and speaking on my tongue.

These are the ghosts

that make me want to kiss

while also holding me back

because the salt on the lips

is also a seed—a promise

of a screaming green, red, and tendrilled thing

that needs and needs and needs more

than I can give. Selah—

that girl from the South

with all of Blanch DuBois’s bad French

and graveyard charm stayed close to me

only for those taut and shivering first days

of Freshman year, away from home and near

all she feared and craved—

the labyrinth of streets, people of different colors,

cigarette smoke, theory, and intelligencia.

Objects of her dread and desire.

Know that a pretty girl wants you,

she kissed me. Unfortunately,

her fiancé back in a Carolina wanted

her more. Forever and ever, amen.

And so, seized by this ghost—a memory

I didn’t want to think about, I sip again.

The ghosts never ask me anything,

just offer up rehashed plates

of my life’s menu

of shame. Swallowing,

I’ve no lips to kiss. I’ve no need

of another drink. Even the bar-

tender agrees. For though the ghosts

are now too far for me to hear their tongues,

mine is lit.