Dan's Poetry Archive

“these are not drafts
toward a future form, but
furious versions
of the here and now…”
- Li-Young Lee

On the screen, we see
the men hit each other
relentlessly, a drumbeat
rhythm of meticulous
camera cuts and well-
timed sounds of wet meat
and bonecrack, an oddly
even exchange of violence
that fulfills an inane set
of contractual obligations,
inexplicable agreements
that no fragile actor’s ego
might encounter anything
as devastating as loss.
It’s unimaginable to me
to demand such a warping
of normalcy, an unsuffering
version of the world, a here
and now where sweat
and clots of dirt exist
only as complements
to over-ripened muscles.
What world-narrative
remains when art and life
are cut free from the pain
that births them in blood
and fire unlike the simulacra
that any squib or special
effect can produce?