How Many Horsepower
for T.L.C.

I want to make something
of your misbehavior
your disrespect for me
your unwillingness to submit

is this what is delicious about you, defiance

how hard, how tight,
I’d have to hold you, squeeze you,
to get you to, to cause you to submit

aware, after all, that I could not be defeated
or disarmed, if you struggled against me
however fiercely

submission, sweetness - if you whispered
I could be made to take the garbage out
or tie or unloose the goats or go for bough

with hatchet, chop wood or wall
or lift you from bath to bed

or with an infant to deliver
lift you to car or ambulance in two arms

I’d do anything for you dear, anything for you

if you knew which buttons
got the cup to fall through
which button for coffee, hot chocolate
or orange juice

choose belligerence
as puny as your powers are
choose to rage against me
as if you were the sea

how can you or I
crack the coil around creation

are you even able to open a corn beef can
with the key attached

inside, beef or horse meat
from Argentina or elsewhere


© Obediah Michael Smith, 2008
6:29 p.m. 26.03.08