Just Fine, but not Great

Even the knife gets dull

“[This poem is] spectacularly graphic and profound.” – A reader

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Just fine,
but not great.

I’m awkward —
but not bad,
at least give me that.

A pinch
of some intelligence,
a mix of mediocrity,
all rolled into a big round ball of bread
that’s over-proofed,
that fails to rise,
and only bakes halfway.

The sad result
of half-assed prep
and indolence.

Truthfulness is sad.
A sad result, indeed.

The bread is bland.

— To think
we lived on bread alone
for some millennia,
as has been said —

But now
we gorge
and eat
and watch
and shit
and fap,

because our bread, today,
is nowhere near enough
to satisfy the cravings
of my smart-but-sluggish mind.

Why speak of lust
or love?

The one
takes thirty minutes;
the other’s
not enough.

How droll!

I use a turn of phrase
that’s got some bite —
a masochistic bite,
but sharpness nonetheless.

Who the fuck says,
“droll”?
How sharp is that?

Poor and sloppy,
dangerous slices
that originate from blunted knives.

Blunted blades,
from overuse?
Or simply cheap,
unfit to cut or stab?

The want
is to be razor sharp,
illustrious
and deeply penetrating —

exposing
sinews,
entrails,
gore —

to see how deep the cut can go,
down to the heart of things.

What is that lying thing in there,
protected by a cage of bones?

The muscle —
is it raw?
Edible?
Can it be squeezed
or trampled?
Broken, perhaps?

Behold the thing,
pounding out in wild heat,
each atrium, alive and filled,
pushing beating blood —

until the knife
— it strikes —
…

What happens then?

The slice is true
and swift
and clean,
worthy of an itamae,
focused
and decisive.

At once the beating ceases.

Two perfect pools
of human wine,
so thick and placid,
held together
by the sanguine chambers,

butterflied
and flaccid,

compressing slowly
into perfectly
symmetric cups.

The cut
hit home.

Now it’s time to drink
unto our health,
unto our human wretchedness:

What doesn’t kill me
makes me more like “art” —
not stronger.

What’s killed me
made me … dead.
Inside, at least.

Slicing
to remove the false
and sluggish spirit of my self
has turned me
into gorged-on art.

I pray
my wine
be like more salt
on the wounds of
for the Earth,

to use for cooking up
another living
work of “art.”

Unfinished,
stunted,
sharp but slow,

too subtle
or too blunt
but never smooth,

and always slighted
for the bit of vanity
we cannot help but show,

to make the world
think better
of us
for just a glimpse or two.

In truth,
to gawk
and point
and jeer —
and then consume.

It’s all the same.

We’re all the same.

If man
could not construe himself,
what chance is there
that woman could?

Each
may be different,
but in the end —
we’re all the same.

Just fine,
but not great.

That’s also wrong:
we’re mostly worse.

So season,
kill,
and eat
the dead.

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