Domestic Violence [poem]
Fists are made for kneading dough when baking bread,
not pummelling another’s face into a gory pulp.
What sickly minds take pleasure in a fistful fight?
To watch two men (or, worse still, women, who are
channels for the gift of life) contuse each other senseless
(though there is no sense in contests from the start)
so that punters will be satisfied, The Mob gets paid
and people think they’ve viewed a thing of worth,
is malady of soul and signals sunset times are here.
When boxers become heroes, called “The Greatest”,
used by gangster impresarios to line their pockets,
damaging the brains of others in their class
while they themselves will lose their minds
to entertain a crowd of thirsty bloodsuckers
(and suckers too for betting on a bloody fight)
and influencing other men to think it’s right,
we know the world is fast descending into
gladiator spectacles, receptacles of dark degrading
entertainment, like the wars waged by the powers
of the air which euphemistically speak of them as
“theatres” for their games, attaining nothing which
I value or behold as keeping peace, for to those suits
what they call “peace” is merely space between two wars.
Fists have not been made to place upon another’s cheek
with force or raised up in the air as if it was a flag denoting
freedom or the power of a people who’ve been beaten up
themselves and should know better than to mimic wholly
what’s been done to them; for fire’s not extinguished by
the flames but by a fountainhead of wisdom from the soul.
So when you told me how your “lover” had laid hands on you,
I wept to think your silken skin had been assailed by clenched
and unrepentant fists — the blows of which I’d gladly take
upon myself instead of you. If only I could stroke that head
on which those blows rained down. (Someday I will). But in
the meantime please accept this posy full of words as if
it was a healing balm to nullify your bruises whether on
your skin or (and these are worse) those hidden deep within.
© Alan Morrison, 2016
The Naked Troubadour 