By Frank Banet

What happens when desire becomes a transaction and expectations remain unfulfilled? In “85K for Six Rounds,” Frank Banet explores lust, intimacy, disappointment and the absurdity of trying to put a price on passion. Through provocative imagery, humour and a frustrated narrator, the poem examines the uneasy intersection of physical longing, money and romantic expectations.

With its dramatic storytelling and ironic conclusion, the poem invites readers to consider what happens when the promises made in private fail to survive the night.

Content advisory: This poem contains explicit sexual language and adult themes.

In the fevered haze of my ovulation moon,
I burned for Okello, that sly, slow-throated boy.
My body sang a wet, insistent tune,
A throbbing ache no pride could quite destroy.

I begged him through the dark:
“Come drown in me tonight.”
He laughed low:
“Monday waits, and you exhaust me, light.”

I offered coins for every thrust he’d give—
Two rounds became six, and hunger made me bid.
Eighty-five crisp thousands flew from my palm to his,
Transport and promise sealed with a trembling kiss.

He arrived at ten, eyes gleaming like a thief.
I fed him quickly, yet my thighs already grieved—
Impatient nectar pooling, slick and sweet.
I rushed to bathe while he claimed the TV seat.

Candlelight flickered gold across the sheets.
I arranged my limbs in silk and secret heat—
Lips parted, back arched, breasts rising like an offering,
My fingers tracing where his mouth should cling.

But sleep, that traitor, claimed my desperate bloom
And left me curled in fragrant, unfulfilled perfume.
He never woke me. Never claimed his paid-for prize.
Dawn stole him silently, leaving candle wax and lies.

The bed still whispered where my body cried,
A single flame burned down while wetness dried.
Okello, you took my fire and my coin,
Left me throbbing, empty, aching to rejoin.

Now the morning mocks with rumpled sheets and scorn—
Eighty-five thousand for a night forever torn.
Come back and finish what my ovulation bought,
Or return the debt in flesh, slow, deep and hot.

Until then, justice tastes like salted skin and sighs—
My rights are simple: let me ride between your thighs.

— Frank Banet