The Incredible Hulk Speaks of Lineage
My nephew slips into the green spandex costume
and proceeds to furl his brow into the best Banner
impression he can, imagining his skin swelling and
splotching with emerald pigment, each fitted glove
melding to his small, soft wrists, his scattered teeth
grinding themselves to a standstill, eyes widening like
two hard-boiled eggs, each capillary and vein bulging,
voice deepening to roar and fists flexing as he beats
his chest and heaves his breath, as if he knows how
his bloodline can boil in an instant, how our family
is a series of matchsticks, of brief and violent flame,
how the green takes his skin, his jawline, each blood
pump inside his small, exploding body and detonates.
My nephew slips into the green spandex costume
and proceeds to furl his brow into the best Banner
impression he can, imagining his skin swelling and
splotching with emerald pigment, each fitted glove
melding to his small, soft wrists, his scattered teeth
grinding themselves to a standstill, eyes widening like
two hard-boiled eggs, each capillary and vein bulging,
voice deepening to roar and fists flexing as he beats
his chest and heaves his breath, as if he knows how
his bloodline can boil in an instant, how our family
is a series of matchsticks, of brief and violent flame,
how the green takes his skin, his jawline, each blood
pump inside his small, exploding body and detonates.
Mjölnir Speaks of Old Love
Love is a heavy hammer
pummeling through
the sodden air, toward
a hand, perhaps. Said
to level whole mountains,
if need be. The mountain,
of course, must see it
coming for miles, assume
its threat, empty. How it
only darts toward earned
hands. An earnest asking:
How many times have
I been the mountain,
motionless and stubborn
in the path of what is
most inevitable? How
the blistering of rock,
fragment of stone, sod
and thin bits of root
rupture at the metal's
strict calling? How to
recognize one's own
impeding spirit, stubborn
blockage? How to let go
if not by thundering force?
I yearn to be this brilliant
combustion. Let the
fleeting wreckage of
a hammer that knows
which grip bears its name
recognize that name
is not mine. To let my own
breaking bestow a duty
through its needed,
and eager demolition.
Love is a heavy hammer
pummeling through
the sodden air, toward
a hand, perhaps. Said
to level whole mountains,
if need be. The mountain,
of course, must see it
coming for miles, assume
its threat, empty. How it
only darts toward earned
hands. An earnest asking:
How many times have
I been the mountain,
motionless and stubborn
in the path of what is
most inevitable? How
the blistering of rock,
fragment of stone, sod
and thin bits of root
rupture at the metal's
strict calling? How to
recognize one's own
impeding spirit, stubborn
blockage? How to let go
if not by thundering force?
I yearn to be this brilliant
combustion. Let the
fleeting wreckage of
a hammer that knows
which grip bears its name
recognize that name
is not mine. To let my own
breaking bestow a duty
through its needed,
and eager demolition.
Benjamin Alfaro is a poet and educator from Detroit, Michigan. He is the co-author of Home Court (Red Beard Press, 2015) and his work has most recently been featured in The BreakBeat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip-Hop (Haymarket Books, 2015). He serves as the Youth Leadership Coordinator for InsideOut Literary Arts Project..