Ode to a Hot Coffee Cup

This poem is part of the collection "Prix Fixe Poetry," which invites its readers to awaken their taste buds to the ordinary. What stories might unfold on an evening walk, or stay untold in a messy kitchen? 

Whenever I need to kiss to suckle I run to you

run a defective sauna turns bitter if not better 

yet a reminder of a hot spring that is not Caution Hot 

spilled all over your forehead ugly as sweaters around your 

crema force-fed cream sugar saliva still half-and-half 

awake so brave the cold outside in your zarf 

I scarf  the lake turned pool turned puddle

in you why carry yourself a Solo Traveler 

Lid let me take that off for you must be 

tired sweat glistening I'm listening to you 

full-bodied what chocolatey acidity

fruity audacity the way you tease me 

with that little bit left turns right into

never-reached heaven coffee-grounds 

coffin dripping caffeine along dark-

roast shadows the halo at your feet

Alistair Lam grew up in Hong Kong. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The New Journal, BR!NK: A Review of Books, L’Amuse-Bouche, Hippo Literary and Arts Magazine, Accent Multilingual Magazine, and elsewhere. A winner of the J. Edward Meeker Prize for Freshman Poetry, he has served as Editor-in-Chief of The Yale Layer, an undergraduate literary and arts magazine focused on mental health.