I promenade around my mouth the two letters
which, repeated, make up your name.
My saliva tastes of honey, strawberry and sugar,
and I pass it from cheek to cheek, over my tongue,
and make it play with my sharpest teeth
so that it clings and lets itself be bitten.
Now and then it sticks to my palate,
or burns my gums, until it’s really smooth;
then it turns into a fish – a piece of soap in water –
escapes, hides from me and leaves a
taste of laurel when, like a god, I go back and hunt it down.
But from playing so long at hide-and-seek,
after relishing it wantonly,
it has gone all small and thin on me,
gone sharp like a razor-blade,
and has made bleed the lips that ate it,
they learned it, and they’ll not be able to leave off saying it.