Rest or fight? Wrong or right? When the going gets tough. Enough. Are you tough enough?
Say the angels. Say the gods. Say the demons. Who pulse in your heart and scream through your ears and tear out your hair.
Can you stand? Alone? On a throne. Made for the kings of this nation. Are you re-making it all? For your image? Alone?
Bone of my bone. Leave me alone.
Fighting is the proper time. That you are not alone. Breaking the silence. Breaking the day. Breaking his hip. Punching at his bloody lip. Stricken, afflicted, and still fighting.
Finding where the fight lives. Where the great life lives. This is it.
That breaks you the hardest That bludgeons your body That smashes your soul Destroying your bones and smothering breath Reducing to dust. To dust you will return. In turn. This is it.
Still Fighting’s not the end. When there’s still pulp to punch. To pulverize to dust. There is still enough. Of you left. Are you tough enough?
Let me go. No. Say the angels. Say the gods. Say the demons. Let me go. No. Says the one who still fights.
Still Sirens call to forget it all. He can’t remember fighting. Protested wars, from before, the dent in his car door, inside, outside, of his control. When did he get so old? Forever holding the peace.
To now sit alone. When the heaving has hushed, and the moment recovers. To less than it was. The hair is gone, the thigh emaciates. Is there is still enough. Of you left?
What is left? Of the man who grappled with terror. The dragons are sleeping, and their fiery tongues left him. Empty.
Alone. Now. Quiet. Now.
What would he give. Now. For the fight. That was left. Years ago. Under the couch.
Lady Rest, Madame Sleeping Giant.
Was this what he worked for? Was this what he loved for? Was this what it was all for?
To rest in peace. Now feels like death. Without any fight. Tonight. Or any other night. Wrong or right. She sang him to sleep, clicking his remote.
