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Brittany Ober There is a secret violence in life
as lovely as the caged tiger's white, flashing teeth.
Futurists believed in the glory of war,
nothing more elegant than a structured attack,
wrote Filippo Marinetti in their manifesto.
"We intend to exalt aggressive action,
a feverish insomnia, the racer's stride,
the mortal leap, the punch and slap."
Gino Severini's figures sneak out of the canvas
the way raptors creep out of the shadows
in black and white dreams.
Sleep doesn't come easy. You lay awake
counting the stresses of an unwritten line,
or pretend you=re a highway shooting across the city-
white slashes separate three lanes-
so simple. The heat clicks on,
snarls through the pipes like dragons.
You lay flat, breathing, lose focus,
and your stomach turns at the thought
of horses struggling, plunged in the ocean.
Maybe Severini could deduce you, paint you
in dynamic thirds, take scissors to your senses,
simplify your thriving complexities
into a sequined canvas, a rushing sequence.
Orange and white
road work cones populate
the sides of the highway.
Somewhere nearby jack hammers
carve out chunks of the road,
and dividers move closer
to cars. Cement fields boast
flashing orange reflectors.
When I was young I tried
to reach for poppies out the window
while my mother drove, but the car moved
too fast, and the flowers streaked
like mandarin and tangerine crayons,
the road a page ripped out of a coloring book.
I grew older, the interstate
barreled onward, and I read Plath:
"Poppies in October" and "Poppies in July."
Her words bloomed along roadsides;
sun bursts exploded, orange
and windy, and I wished
I could leave the car on 78E
and run through fields
scribbled with petals.
Ten years later, I hit him after one
too many vodka martinis,
or maybe one too many Manhattans,
(perhaps too many gin and tonics)
and the next morning when I saw the scratches
around his neck, and his busted lips
that I usually fell asleep while kissing,
I was pissed that he hadn't hit me.
Weren't men supposed to slap
women so their eyes resembled two 8 balls?
I watched Dennis Hopper, perfectly
macho in a cowboy hat,
wail on Maria in The Last Movie
until her face looked like a nighttime
shade at the MAC counter.
I once saw a friend throw his younger brother
on the floor of a cramped condominium
living room, complete with Victorian decorations
and pink cushioned chairs. His bloody nose
sprayed the carpet red. I felt drunk
as a witness to violence, and even though
it happened between two men,
I imagined myself a part of the fight:
my elbows sharper than knives,
fists harder than rocks
and fingernails like awls
for poking holes in leather. |