A Starfish

Poetry | Jaco Beneduci

The belly dancers move their bubbling bodies across the cold

Wood floor in a cluster, their feet 

–Uncountable steps.

Their bubbling bodies:

Waves boil from the guts of starfish to their hands

Evaporating at the fingertips.

Fingers are the hands 

–Are actually the feet

–Are attached to the gut

Centered in the body.

They take turns

Feet anchored to the floor

But there was one with feet like words:

The starfish dances wild
–Her tossing hairs

–Her bubbling body

Her heat waves toward me

From her fingertip’s uncountable steps.

The starfish belly dances over

Whatever hard-shelled, thick-skulled bottom feeder 

It wishes to melt.