Chavisa Woods

Ode to He
a praise poem


man
father
lover
bone

he gave us his bone
to bring us
life

I am that hole
in his cage

flesh of walnut shells
the wrinkled
balls of our fathers
sweat with the nut
of existence
hanging,
nay,
cradling
the leathery bassinet
of life’s
primordial stem
from which spewed
every woman

man,
your rocket
launched
it all

spasms of being
ricochet
from
the walls
of congress
to steakhouses and
sports bars
echoing with the fragrant sound of men
threading their wars
he is
the blood spilled throughout
civilizations
All Father, Odin
his gallows branch
pierces
the cunt of the world

he is
the virginal boy
longing
when he first enters
asking
“can you feel that?”
in one voice
man cries out
for sandwiches
his vital sap
erupting
like mayonnaise
squeezed
onto
parted loaves

he is
the spurt
of the finished
bottle

he

wants to know
if he seems gay

he

cannot
clean up
after
himself

we

must
take
up
the
mop
and broom
for him
because he gives us
dick

father’s love tests us
tests sting,
testing
testosterone
test is
test is cicles…
father’s love is
cold
testicles
man

you have
a bat
and a ball
and you know
how to hit it

seven minutes
or less
is your average

you grunt and
head
butt
cascade
energy drinks
over
protruding brows

the sheer banana sausage
the eggplant of you
chastens me

we are hollow
without your
veined rods
to fill
our cylinders
man
you unstable
reactor
the disaster of
your meltdowns
contaminates
the rivers of the world
flowing with
your ooze
to sea foam

you are why
the mermaids scream
calling seamen
to canonical bosoms
away from your cannon fodder
you battleship boys
shoot
without
aiming
and
cover me

I am
a bukoki
snowwoman
for him
I am jism and glass
he blows
me
he rides me
he chides me
he
doesn’t really
want me
to vote

he is his castle’s king
his penile code
is law

our sun
rises with his morning wood
and settles with his
bowels

our father is
scanning the business section
on his porcelain throne
grunting against the
pressure
of his new high-protein diet

he has turned fifty
he has bought
a new sports car
he is
holding the door open
because he can’t find the milk

he needs us
to find the milk for him

it’s in the middle
of the top shelf
front and center
he drinks
right from
the jug

the dusty son, sweating in a jersey
spent lover
thirsty father

ageless
leaning against
the fridge door
gulping down
cool white stuff
in the dim light
of the small, energy-efficient bulb
illuminating
what is dripping
from his chin

he wipes it
on his sleeve
then screws the cap on
and places the bottle
back where
he couldn’t find it
for himself
even though
he put it there
in the first place

he’s the only one
who drinks from that
container
anymore

he does not
realize

he is praying
to an expired god

he is the staff
that parted our Red Sea

he is the dick-shaped cloud in the sky
when he dreams wet,
it rains

he is the boy stomping his galoshes in the puddle
and the splashed father
yanking the boy away

he is the bearded one
who laughs
at our
best laid
plans
he lays
our plans
best
he is
himself
all man
all men
amen

I hope you choke on lumps of stars

I hope you feel me like a cold lonely song
that won’t leave your head
that leaves you so lonely and cold
you think the starship trap door dumped you
out there in Andromeda
to float and scream at the god of absolute darkness,
like you left me screaming in this city of idiots,
and there is no answer

I hope you can’t breathe out there in outer space
I hope you have no control over your direction
I hope you miss the ground
as much as I miss you

I hope you realize I loved you
I hope an alien comes and plucks out one of your eyes
so you know I how I feel

I hope you impale yourself on a moonbeam
darling,
I hope your blood floats around you in droplets like milk in those astronaut videos
I hope it’s totally gross
I hope you try to swat it away
but it just keeps separating

I hope you see that giant floating baby
I hope it’s really horrific
I hope it completely alienates and horrifies you

I hope that while you’re bleeding out there in outer space
with one eye
feeling alienated and horrified
you suddenly get pulled into some unknown planet’s gravity
and go crashing through its atmosphere

I hope you really get burned

but I hope you don’t die
because I want you to live through this,
and when the talking apes come for you
I hope you’re very alert
and try to communicate
but it sounds like barking to them,

I hope they put you in a cage
and boss you around
I hope they make you feel like an imbecile who has no language

I hope they insult you in public for no good reason
and poke you with sticks

I hope they get mad at you
and won’t tell you
what you did wrong

I hope this happens on your birthday
I hope they make a big scene about it
and throw poo at you
I hope your girlfriend is there to see it, somehow

I hope you fall in love with one of these apes
I hope she thinks you’re lame
but fucks you repeatedly anyway
without ever really seeing
what you’re worth

I hope this ape lady completely tortures you emotionally
I hope she makes you her house slave
and puts you to work at hard labor
and won’t kiss you unless she’s fucking you

I hope she tells you not to feel romantically toward her
and when you pretend not to
I hope she does a complete one-eighty suddenly and gets very upset at you
for not caring enough
about her

I hope she starts gnashing her teeth and screeching like ape’s do,
tearing around the room
her eyes wild as Madagascar
I hope that ape lady pisses on your head
then dumps you out in the jungle of her alien planet
in the middle of the night

I hope it’s really dark out there
I hope there are three blood-red moons in the sky
I hope you hear weird noises and you don’t know what they are
I hope the trees look like scary lizards covered in snot
I hope it smells
bad

I hope you find a crashed starship in one of the snotty lizard-trees
and you figure out how to jumpstart it and fly yourself out of there,
then, when you’re out there in outer space
heading back home, feeling safe
I hope you are trying to turn that lonely song on the radio
down 
but instead, you hit the trap door ejector button,

I hope the whole thing happens to you again
in the exact same order
just one more time