Sam Stokley

Lizard Boy in Love

It’s supposed biology will take
over, so Lizard Boy waits for it

to come. In his scaly body
he watches all warm

flesh, acutely tuned to danger
and desire. One time two mantises

completed biology on the rock adjacent.
He watched one lose its head

to ecstasy, then Lizard Boy, compelled,
took the sated mantis into his mouth

and chewed. Intimacy continues
in this way. Lizard Boy loves

safety and gorging on locusts.
Lizard Boy might lose a part

of his body when biology comes.
Lizard Boy loves possibility; of undevoured

berry bushes; a plague of crickets
fat on dewy grass. He watches

lizards he grew up with get ripped
open by teeth and talons. Lizard Boy

waits.

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Sam Stokley is a disabled artist, educator, and editor from Peoria, IL living in Minneapolis. A 2019 finalist for BOAAT Press' and Driftwood Press' chapbook prizes, Sam's writing can be found now or soon inside Driftwood Press, Brevity, Fairy Tale Review, Poetry City, and other homes. He has recessive dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa. Follow Sam on IG (@bovinii).