Amazing at Football

At the first poetry club meeting, I tried to teach the kids how to write a slam poem. I told them to think of things from their past that had made them sad, mad, or hurt them; and to write about it. One method I told them was to write as if they were saying everything they had ever wanted to say to someone, if that person had to listen and couldn't interrupt. I didn't quite do that, but I tried taking my own advice and this is what popped out.

Amazing at Football

There's a kid
who carves swastikas
into his eyelids
and his cheeks
he's pretty creepy
but I can talk to him about you
he understands
all the things I want
to do to you
not really, I suppose
neither of us do
we're both in 4th grade
we don't really know what it means
to tie someone up
out in the woods
cut them a thousand times
add salt and vinegar
and let them lie there
for a few weeks
we talk about it
I, I dream about it
but we've probably just seen it
in the movies
sure, it's monstrous
but for ou
it's more than you deserve
my mother doesn't scream
not when you put her
through the shower door
not when you wrap your hands
around her throat
not when you're stringing nooses
in the backyard
there's thuds and grunts
but she only screams
when you come after us
my sisters are not sluts
my brother and I are not pieces of shit
you could've worked for Pinochet
you know every spot on the body that hurts
from the web of the ears
to the nerves in the armpit
they cry, they scream
so Mom screams
I don't
not anymore
I don't scream
I don't cry
I'm used to it
thanks to you
I do not feel pan
I'm aware it exists
but I can turn it off
like a switch
I will say this
it makes me amazing at football
good thig I'm the oldest
that I'm big, that I'm a boy
it means I piss you off the most
it means I can take the heat
off the others
I can handle the fists
and the belt
and the boots
it means I can endure
it means I'm gonna be awesome at football
but
it doesn't mean I'm strong enough
to stand up to you
to feed you a steak knife
while you sleep
to Mark McGwire a cast-iron skillet
at your temple
while you're busy
with someone else's neck
to end you and our suffering
to make the lives
of six roses and one hawk
better
I'm amazing at footbal
but you don't care,
and I'm sick of it
sick of the question
"what does your father do?"
and making up some new story
so sick of hearing
"he's such a great father"
and biting back the truth
sick of tasting the salt in my blood
like the lies of home sweet home
so sick of being a father
at 12, 14, 16, 18
so sick of being terrifie
of worrying about blood on the walls
when I call the house
and no one picks up the phone
I'm sick of making more money than you
I'm in high school
it's not my job
to put food on the table
I'm sick of the numb horror
at watching someone else
hit the wall floor furniture
because I didn't get in the way
fast enough
I'm sick of all this
and it makes me fucking amazing at football
because I run on rage
I channel fire and hell
I put kids in the hospital
I run raw fuck you all across 100 yards
white hot yellow supernova
and it scares teh fuck out of me
because I look like you
I sound like you
and my biggest fear
is that I am you
that this fire
that runs me
that loves me
that consumes me
is yours
my model for life
is everything you are not
my to-do list is
everythin you never did
my moral code
is not doing what you are
so I used to speak to Swastika Boy
of vigilantism and vengeance
I broke the children of the woods
while they broke my legs and hands
ntil the screams are gone
I took and tossed girls
like the Band-Aids they weren't
it's so much easier to help someone else
than to fix yourself
let me love you
and be your needy cure
but I've seen where that goes
and my worst future is your footsteps
so forget being amazing at football
I found release for rage in ink
on skin
and page
I don't need this fire
I've got water and ice
to melt the mountains
to wash it all away
fuck football
I'd rather be the real thing
you never even imagined
a friend
a lover
a partner
a husbad
a son
a human
an artist
a worker
a person
a man

I dont' think it reads very well, but it was fun, and it's good to perform. This week, I think.