GOYA

Three corpses bound to a tree stump,

castrated, one without arms, its head impaled

on a branch. A dark impression, richly inked,

with a delicate burnishing of figures. Pondering it,

I feel like a worm worming. If I want the truth,

I must seek it out. The line between the inner

and outer erodes, and I become a hunter putting

my face down somewhere on a path between

two ways of being—one kindly and soft;

the other an executioner. Later, out in the plaza,

I light a cigarette and have a long pull,

with small exhales, taking the measure

of my own hand, its lustrous hairy

knuckles dinged from grinding meat.