Tracy K. Smith

Some of the prisoners were strung like beef

From the ceilings of their cells. “Gus”

Was led around on a leash. I mean dragged.

Others were ridden like mules. The guards

Were under a tremendous amount of pleasure.

I mean pressure. Pretty disgusting. Not

What you’d expect from Americans.

Just kidding. I’m only talking about people

Having a good time, blowing off steam.

She gets herself so wound up. I think

She likes it. Like a wrung rag, or a wire

Wrapped round itself into a spring.

And the pressure, the brute strength

It takes to hold things that way, to keep them

From straightening out, is up to her

To maintain. She’s like a kettle about to blow.

All that steam anxious to rise and go.

I get tired watching it happen, the eyes

Alive with their fury against the self,

The words swelling in the chest, and then

The voice racing into anyone’s face.

She likes to hear it, her throat hoarse

With nonsense and the story that must

Get told again and again, no matter.

Blast off! she like to think, though

What comes to mind at the moment

Is earthly. A local wind. Chill and small.

Give a man a stick, and he’ll hurl it at the sun

For his dog to race toward as it falls. He’ll relish

The snap in those jagged teeth, the rough breath

Sawing in and out through the craggy mouth, the clink

Of tags approaching as the dog canters back. He’ll stoop

To do it again and again, so your walk through grass

Lasts all morning, the dog tired now in the heat,

The stick now just a wet and snarled nub that doesn’t sail

So much as drop. And when the dog plops to the grass

Like a misbegotten turd, and even you want nothing

More than a plate of eggs at some sidewalk café, the man –

Who, too, by now has dropped even the idea of fetch –

Will push you against a tree and ease his leg between

Your legs as his industrious tongue whispers

Convincingly into your mouth.