Mercy

one o f us; we all get loved by him, rolled up in him, rolled over

by him; his thighs embrace us; he births us and he fucks us, a

patriarch’s vision, we take him in our mouths, grateful; he

used words to paint great dreams, visionary wet dreams,

dem ocracy’s wet dreams; for the worker and the whore; each

and all loved by him; and in his stead, as he’s busy writing

poems, all these others, the common men, push it in and

come; I loved him, the words, the dreams; don’t believe them,

don’t love them, don’t obey the program written into the

poem, a series o f orders from the high commander o f pain;

bare the throat, spread the legs, suck the thing; only he was

shy, a nineteenth-century man, they didn’t say it outright

then; he said he wanted everyone, to have them, in the poems;

he wanted to stick it in everywhere; and be held too, the lover

who needs you, your compassion, a hint o f recognition from

you, a tenderness from your heart, personal and singular; the

pitiful readers celebrate the lyric and practice the program, the

underlying communication, the orders couched in language as

orgasmic as the acts he didn’t specifically say; he was lover,

demanding lover, and father; he spread his seed everywhere,

over continents; as i f his ejaculation were the essence o f love; as

i f he reproduced him self each time; with his hand he made

giants; as if we all were his creatures; as i f his sperm had

washed over the whole world and he begat us, and now he’d

take us; another maniac patriarch, a chip o ff the old block; the

epic drama o f a vast possession as i f it were an orgy o f

brotherly love, kind, tender, fraternite; as if taking everyone

were gentle, virile but magnanimous, a charity from body to

body, soul to soul; none were exempt, he was the poet o f

inclusion; you could learn there were no limits, though you

might not know the meaning until after they had touched you,

all o f them, his magnificent masses, each one; you could stay

as innocent, or nearly, as the great, gray poet himself, until

yo u ’d done the program; then you’d be garbage somewhere,

your body literal trash, without the dignity o f a body bag,

something thrown out, dumped somewhere, sticky from

sperm, ripped inside, a torn anus, vaginal bruises and tears, a

ripped throat; the tissue is torn; there’s trauma to the tissue,

says the doctor, detached, not particularly interested; but the

tissue is flesh, o f a human, and the trauma is injury, o f a

human, the delicate lining o f the vagina is flesh, the interior

lining o f the throat is flesh, not meant for invasion, assault;

flesh lines the anus; it’s already limned with cracks and

bleeding sores; mortal fools bleed there, we are dying all the

time; lo ve’s intense and there will be great, jagged rips, a