A mango is sex, right? The good kind. (I thought about saying a fuck instead of sex but fuck has become asexual. We need more verbs for sex, don’t we? Good ones. Porn has really fucked so many of them) Eating a ripe mango when you’re starving is sex, though, isn’t it? The oversized yet weirdly tight jacket you have to shake off. The juice running down your elbow while your mouth fills with want. Sliver after sliver. Sweeter than sweet. Each layer stoking the hunger while feeding it. More mango you have, more mango you want, when it’s the good kind. Then (all too soon) you get to that cartilage bit in the middle. Now you suck it (go in with teeth if necessary) The last threads of mango have to be yours. Now you’re wet. Mango on your chin. Do you lick it from your not-so-clean fingers? It’s ninety seven pence. Has come five thousand four hundred and ninety six miles and that’s only if it came direct but flights don’t, do they? It’s more like six thousand seven hundred and thirty three miles and countless underpaid farmers went through who knows what for you to have this twenty five second experience, so, you suck each finger dry, wipe your lips and then take a nap on the table.

Christina Carty is an Irish screenwriter and poet. Her poetry has been commissioned by the London Irish Centre and the Irish Arts Council. 

Instagram: @irishwriteher

Twitter: ChristinaCarty_