Pain

Pain

Animals in the wild are perfect and know nothing
About pain. Also perfect
Is an Olympic sprinter pulling off
His jersey after a race; the body, flexing
For TV, blinds you; Oh, you say,
That’s what it’s supposed to look like.
But all wild animals are like this because they live
In a perpetual Olympics. There’s no
Margin for error out there
And any ragged flock of gulls
Surfing a wind current, any rag
Of a jackrabbit poised by the roadside
Dwells in the lean, perfected moment; one
Busted bone, one gray hair, one
Moment’s inattention and he’s a goner,
Crunched in the maw of a larger, wilder
Perfection. That’s why
They’re wild; pain

Never has a chance to teach them
A thing. The parakeet in his cage
Of pain, the ferret on his sexy chain,
Nosing the nipple ring
Of a tattooed punker, the cocker
Spaniel tied by the neck
To the railing outside Starbucks, waiting
For the slim blonde in the pale
Translucent blouse to finish her latte
With the pale unshaven man she’s enjoying
Breaking up with; they’re not wild
But bewildered, like us, having learned
From us what pain is, and thus
What it is to be tame, and human.

Copyright by George Bilgere
Poems from The Good Kiss
Winner of the Akron Poetry Award
(through the Akron State University Press)
Posted over on the Bilgere Home Page