A Better Language

A Better Language

Nothing more than sharks circling blood,
the brood of a dozen move as one upon
the perceived threat (yet less hurtful than
a thundercloud to a seal).

They could not hide their contempt for
the species they surrounded, and reeking
of testosterone, flexed their ignorance
in their attempt to drive the intrusion
to the ocean’s bottom.

Their nostrils flared, spit and grease,
their noses broken in previous altercations.
Referees sometimes get it wrong and fists are left
to make an impact on the foul unrighted.

Animals incite without a moment’s thought;
hormones calling the shots.
Men, on the other hand, find a moment
for amends, post-aggressive for the
names sprayed with saliva (without excusing it
as a simple shot across the bow.)

Find a place to tear each other’s rights away,
fight the night in an alley, choose up sides
among the sharks, and stick your chins
into each others’ chests.

But don’t take down the suspected foul
on the pickup field, city-league soccer,
when the offender is twice your age,
half-a-century, to your mid-twenties.
It takes courage, meat in the mouth,
blood in the teeth, to swarm around that
middle-aged man, for such a sorry foul as his.
It takes strength, and focus, and such a command
of the language
to call teenage girls names, with your chins stuck out
and your nostrils ablaze. Your toddlers watched your rage.

But do not expect, for a moment, or a school year’s term,
anyone to back down whose prodigies are treated like
cheap-cut-glass on the shelves. Their lowest stutterers
speak a better language than you.