the two times I saw your penis

It slipped from its netting and into view
when I was seven, a dog’s tongue
lolling from the leg of your shorts.
The next time: it was in my hand, smaller
than I’d remembered. From a caravan
one week in to the summer holidays
to a bed hours from the end. How then
not to laugh at that accidental flash,
or to think of flaccid and turgid cells
in fifth-form biology, but to keep it steady
against the dish, pretend I’m not holding it,
that you aren’t peeing your last; life
running from you, quiet and warm.

Published in The North 41