Three Poems
Zing
To this day I like licking nine volts, the zots
from the cold metal poles and am sorry a little bit
that licking my wife isn’t like that, a little bit
that air isn’t one hundred and twenty volts, that I can’t
plug my table saw into a cloud, on the other hand
I haven’t tried, haven’t opened a window in a plane
and reached into this possible communication,
or said to a doctor, how can an enlarged heart
be a bad thing, such as yesterday at the hospital
when my mom’s swollen ticker afforded me the chance
to interject thus, I have to tell you my wife
won’t like the start of this poem, or when her grandmother
dies, or when drought kills her flowers, even if I tell her
it’s an evolution to tatters I find lovelier
than when the breeze was lithe with the currents
of their blooms, but I may not be the best judge of beauty
or anything, I lick batteries, remember, it’s like electroshock
for cowards, like practicing French kissing lightning
or American kissing thunder, a jolt of enthusiasm, spritz
of wake-up sent arrowing to the brain, mine lives
in a cave with the lights off, is that why sorrow grows
like mold, god I have questions, why don’t zealots
see how boring they are, does bird song
really travel better in morning air, answers
will arrive in pieces that may not resemble the whole,
and one day when I shiver, it’ll my skin
feeling your eyes walking across this poem
Getting there is three eighths the fun
He was troubled by how busy his sperm were
under the microscope at home. It’s like
there’s a factory inside me
that never shuts down, he said to her
at thirty five thousand feet over Kansas.
Why would you look at your sperm
at your age, she asked, pulling grass
from her pocket and spreading it on the tray.
I was curious if they’d resemble me,
if I’d want to protect them
or send them to college. Did you feel anything,
she asked, eating the grass
one blade at a time. Afraid, he said,
there were so many and they
were so insanely intent
that I worried they’d break out
of my testicles and find their way
to my eyes. She touched the back of his hand
with a blade of grass, as if to bring a field
to his fear and make it fall asleep
in a breeze. Should I take the microscope
away? He thought of everything
he’d looked at, his hair, skin, blood,
spit, his feces, his toe nails. Thank you,
but I’d miss myself, he said,
which made sense to her
and she told him so. That makes sense to me,
she said, looking out her window
at the reliability of Kansas — you think farm
and there is a farm, you think flat
and the Earth agrees with you — her grass
nearly gone, a bit of bark
in her other pocket for later.
A religious experience
Long ago I found God
shucking corn. I said everyone’s been looking for you,
he said I am everyone, I have not been looking for me.
I said everyone minus you has been looking for you,
what are you doing? Practicing, he said, for the corn
shucking contest at the State Fair: the person
who shucks the most corn in fifteen minutes
gets a goat. But you’re God, I said, you can just make
a goat. He said it’s not the same to make a goat
when you can be given a goat for doing something well,
I will prove it if you do something well. I looked
at the sun and didn’t blink for thirty seconds
masterfully without going blind. You did that
very well, he said, here is your goat. It was not the same
as finding a goat or stealing a goat or being given a goat
for no reason other than a man has too many goats
and you happen to walk by and appear to be a person
who will accept a goat, it was better, like waking up
taller or with a wing for a tongue. I said, thank you
for the goat, I won’t tell anyone where you are,
and noticed that shucked corn is kind of drab
and said that shucked corn is kind of drab. He said,
I’m sorry for that, I could have done better, like I did
with volcanoes and zebras. And innocence, I said,
that remains impressive. You still have that, he asked?
I said yes, in small quantities, in bright colors,
in bold actions from high wires and tree tops.
You know I do root for you, he said. I said sometimes
when the rain hides, when the wind dies, when my heart stops,
I hear you rooting for us. Really, he said. No, I said,
but pretending is something I do very well. He said,
here is a second goat, a liar-goat to go
with your sun-staring goat, I am to this day
older and afraid and eager and a rich man, goat-wise.
~
Bob Hicok’s most recent collection is Words for Empty and Words for Full (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2010). This Clumsy Living (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2007), was awarded the 2008 Bobbitt Prize from the Library of Congress. His other books are Insomnia Diary (Pitt, 2004), Animal Soul (Invisible Cities Press, 2001),a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, Plus Shipping (BOA, 1998), and The Legend of Light (University of Wisconsin, 1995), which received the Felix Pollak Prize in Poetry and was named a 1997 ALA Booklist Notable Book of the Year. A recipient of five Pushcart Prizes, a Guggenheim and two NEA Fellowships, his poetry has been selected for inclusion in six volumes of Best American Poetry.