Bovine

    black milk glass

    i look down at the body
    to see what shape its in.

    earth-born son, turquoise slap
    of my mother against the golden-
    bangled mother. i let them come.

    my dark tongues flickering, my heads
    Cancerian fire. every tip would touch you.

    the shoulders of a bull, eyelashes lower
    over tender pools obsidian. im a cow.

    a ticket to the fight. my velvet
    suit. warm press of skin.
    i drink, i let it come.

    dragging behind its un-
    translatable blade.


    //

    Socrates: (in Charmides, cont.)

    and in that same spot
    i (they) take hold altogether of many

    those (on the one hand) unknown by me
    those (on the other hand) the most thoroughly-known

    // 153α

    καὶ αὐτόθι κατέλαβον πάνυ πολλούς

    τοὺς μὲν καὶ ἀγνῶτας ἐμοί
    τοὺς δὲ πλείστους γνωρίμους

    animal event (at the school of Taureos)

    into the animal event
    i have been dragged and well
    indeed

    every year the same, i guess, except
    this time
    its me

    and like the bull, whos horn, whos unbroken
    rage
    your hand anointed

    when they seize the bodied, lashed and harnessed
    nerve by muscle to
    the craters edge

    as trampled roses bruised into the pass
    will grind in
    to mud by mountain makers hooves

    in magenta-black menstrual blood
    my terror
    my appetite


    //

    Socrates: (in Charmides, cont.)

    and well indeed into the wrestling-
    school of Taureos (where bulls are offerings)

    straight down from the temple
    of the Queen (of whom nothing is known)

    // 153α

    καὶ δὴ καὶ εἰς τὴν Ταυρέου παλαίστραν
    τὴν καταντικρὺ τοῦ τῆς Βασίλης ἱεροῦ εἰσῆλθον