What the Men Said

divisions take on the character of said

conflict, sliding into the role as if

to say, ‘here I am

apart’ or something larger

the grandfather would say it

in silence and a swift

whack of power comes

with no context

the men stood around

bereft and swinging for

the fences—fame I suppose,

some sort of immortality

caught up in the sting of

knowing the pain could be lost could

be healed                under

here the men said the getting

was good and everything was

freedom which means pain

inflicted quietly, in domesticated ways

means seven of the eight readers

were men and the one woman was

coined in brass and strung out

here the men are libertine, which means

ancient and schooled in the ways of

creeping posts and grooming the style,

the candor of oppression

here the men said nothing has happened

and will never

ungulate blood

the map was inconclusive and where

we were was a matter of

conversation, gesture, weather

the mother was looking not

for us but for shelter from

our knowing

anything

the books were still

the dull red spots in the snow

are not a cipher but the first

thing that a new world would know