How Else Today

That justly famous scene where all the monster
yearns to do is play, out of nothing but joy,

with the pigtailed girl . . . and now look
at her drowned and mangled body. It's the same

in a way when the villagers finally trap him,
and the mill burns to the ground: the fire always thinks

it's celebrating the wood. How festive, the fire believes,
how . . . total! There are many more examples, but I'm wearying

of every god who'd murdered for the increase
of his people, every rock show's list of injuries,

becoming the occasion for a lesson
on the hurt loves of my friends; although how else today

to understand the way this opened collar shows
a secret scarf of bruises, that

began as adoration.

Copyright © 2005 Albert Goldbarth All rights reserved
from New Letters
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission