David Villaverde
H E A D C A N O N ( I I I )
“We lash with the best or worst / Word last!” — Gerard Manley Hopkins
“the English language is violence, I hotwired it / I got a hold of the master’s tools
and got dialed in” — Billy Woods
Born bully
born bum, torn
slag lump from
squalid slum.
Rose sullen
knees blooded
scorned scud
swung skunked
on tilth & dun.
Thus bluff is spun:
tiny tyrant to
tumult to thug
plunked down
where filth
comes son.
Forewarned
to wrangle rot
worn, he lurched
starboard & sunk
plumb, a sulk won
below lurked hull
with gelid thumb.
Hulked null
& spot stung
a turbid rumor
wrought dull on
caught tongue.
Unadorned he
slunk glum, out
strung on junk
till he slumped
numb. Skull
bumped. Bottle
broken. Done.
Born bunco, born blotto,
bobbing backward
but bursting boffo.
Spurned sum, sawn
and stump slung
hunkered flush
he churned glut
of green & clot
of lung. By he
I mean me.
Gutter scum
struck like
stuck gum,
half-drunk
and half-spun
I sputtered some,
stood slow
but then
I sung.
H E A D C A N O N ( V I )
“All forms of landscape are autobiographical.” — Charles Wright
“A pastoral…that’s any poem that’s got sheep in it.” — James Galvin
