Combat

She faced him, white teeth savagely bared,
Katana outthrust with expert precision;
To where had the woman he recognized fled,
From where came this seething, violent fury?
Between meetings emotions so easily fired
In the genuine times, were suddenly shift,
Tranforming her valleys and wonderous ridges
Into bitter engine of lifestealing death.

Swept almost away by her eye's feral gleaming,
He fought off the chill of mortality's coaxing;
Like he willed to be free of the insistent vision
Of heaving breasts and sweatstreaked skin.
In minor defeat his gaze moved to her flank,
Piercing through sparks from a nearly missed parry,
To fall on the scabbard now swinging empty
The desperate sheath he'd once given her full.

She snarled and lunged, arching her blade,
Catching his guard with a powerful blow;
Unable to harm her, he was blinded to cunning
And twisted, too late, from her furious steel.
Blades locked, wrists strained, balances fought,
Steel ground against steel at untoward angle;
Until CRACK! her blade snapped, went whirling away
Taking his with it and out of his grasp.

From between her breasts she drew forth a dagger,
Smiling coldly at him as he pulled forth its match,
And realized her tactics: advantage was hers
In the training she'd had with feminine arms.
Confined in space, feinting, they circled each other,
Judging the distances with conflicting emotions;
He, like she, fought hoarsely for breath
Inhaling the scent of the other's exertions.

Perhaps in his eyes she saw hint of confusion
And took it as weakness and thus leapt upon him;
He couldn't evade and they tumbled together
Hand clutching wrist, went rolling over and over.
Her hot, panting breath intermingled with his
As legs writhed entwined and abdomens heaved;
Desperate they clung in the fight for position
While their knives grated behind corded sinew.

Grunting, he found himself drawn in her eyes--
Large, deep, and liquid--and felt stirring inside;
Struggling for life, he felt what she wanted
Felt her hate's strength, and hunger's conviction.
And he fought to push down that other emotion
As her heat and her sweat melted with his;
Her flesh was both hard and soft against his
And her, "I want to kill you," was almost a moan.

The warrior watched dagger, controlled it for life,
While the man inside him was conscious of breast;
Her thigh was imprisoned, caught fast by his legs,
But the other fought over to straddle his side.
Her calf pressed against buttocks, rolling him over
With the leverage of nature driving her fury,
Slammed his head to the stone as she ground against him
Until all he could see was blade pulsing with light.

She panted through mouth, lips pulled from pearl teeth,
With thighs convulsive as she rocked hard against him,
And her breath rasped raw, caught hoarse in her throat
And he lost sight of the knife in her wondrous shudders;
Hard, even now, beneath death's crushing breath,
He heaved against her to regain control of her knife,
Whose tip nicked his throat as his body spent out,
Adding his life's heat to their mingling sweat.

-Kevin Higgins