Text
afterwards
on the beach in the surf alone
were you on your knees in the muck
and the lapping waves?
were you fetal was there brine in your mouth
was there salt you tried to retch out?
did you try to slough your old body off
in the wet sand
did you wriggle like a fish in the mud
did you shed skin and mucus and bile
and phlegm and piss and pus
did you feel the waves lap your toes like hot blood
and run?
and did you also look at your toes,
still your toes but new
your calves, legs
did you look for blood under your nails
and on your thighs and find none?
did you look at little blond hairs trailing to black,
did you run your palms over your belly
and find a thicket
did you press your fingers to your chest
did you find your body like a whip uncoiling
like a green shoot in spring
did you lie naked on soft moss
did you hold your cock like a small and precious bird
did you feel the rush of blood
did you fuck your own hand til you came
did you howl to hear your cavernous howl
did you touch your sand-stubble face
did you piss standing up to see how it felt
did you shake your whole body like a dog in the sun?
Caeneus–
how did you come to fight the centaurs?
and your invulnerable skin–
did you think it a blessing at first,
or did you know it was curse all along?
did you test its limits and, finding none,
did you lash yourself out in search of them?
did you get in barroom brawls
did you wait tensed all night in the dark,
uncurl your coiled fists upon would-be-rapists
like the wrath of no-god
did you bar the door and snarl at shadows
did you try fucking and being fucked
by women and men
and did you crawl up inside your own body
and put out the lights
did you try this over and over and over and over
and every time did your mind go blank
like a quiet sea
did your marble skin break and bleed and burn
not on a spear’s point but at a lover’s caress and
yet still crawl pink and whole
upon your beautiful frame
did your lovers tell you all they found in you was
your ghost?
did you read scholarly work
on the science of fucking and being fucked,
did you learn technical terms
and statistics and acronyms
and when that didn't fix you did you try poetry
and when that didn't work
did you go to war instead?