Tuesday, August 25, 2020

The Bullfight


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The Bullfight

We paid extra to sit on the shady side
of the the Plaza de Toros de Monumental.
White handkerchiefs in our hands to
to wave and mop our brows.
The bull was splendid, an ancient, mighty,
visitor, we should have knelt in supplication.
Nothing was alive as he. His hooves
trampled the sand, his breath was thunder.
The matador entered the ring like dawn,
golden spangles, a dancer’s body, and
that cape! Magenta and gold, a living
thing swirling in front of the bull.
As a child I rescued broken-winged birds,
three-legged kittens, and blind hamsters.
No creature was beyond my ministering
grace, no bug too ugly to be redeemed
But then, as blood flowed like lava
down the black velvet of the bulls
legs, and the bull fighter bared his chest
before the exhausted animal
I realized, startled, that blood calls to blood
and I felt my heart race, and I yelled
as loudly as anyone in the crowd when
the sword pierced between the shoulder
blades and filled the bull’s lungs with blood.

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