A priori: All meat
is tenderized the same way.
Good meat is beat lifeless
before you eat.
I know I am good
meat because men say it. Bludgeoned
plum by the hammer, I am tender.
Bludgeoned by ten thousand
tons of my own kidskin, I
am tender. All meat is tenderized
the same way. Good meat
is beat lifeless before you eat.
The pyloric jowl of my gut,
mucking me tender. Lucky
in the sun, gutless, plumb on a hook. Agèd
& tongue-perfect.
All meat is tenderized the same way,
all good meat beat lifeless before you eat.
Rax King is a dog-loving, hedgehog-mothering, beer-swilling, gay and disabled sumbitch who occasionally writes poetry and works as assistant editor for Sundress Publications. She is the author of the collection The People’s Elbow: Thirty Recitatives on Rape and Wrestling (Ursus Americanus 2018). Her work can also be found in Barrelhouse, Peach Mag, and Glass Poetry.
Image: Matthew Klein
Pine Hills Review 