Note from a Symp II: For the Men

from Ser Templeton Esq.

I said, "I wanna war-cry
for the muses in us,"
and Will's friend Jules
said that, "just fucks."

And ain't that a thing?

For, what fucks more
than what is good in us?
Isn't a good fuck nothing
more than what is good in us?
Are the muses in us not
a portion of what is good in us?
Is the war-cry not a scrap of good
howling most for the whole good?

God, sometimes the hate
of this world fills me like mercury
and I struggle to rise over the sadness,
but never have I forsaken the Good.

Now, let me postulate:
I am as to Earth the redeemer
or
I may as well be
because
I have spent the past months
crucified
for what is good in me.

I am not the Christ,
but I do share the flesh.
So much flesh.
And flesh is good, isn't it,
baby?
Isn't the flesh of a pitiful man
a delicacy?

Men will read my words
and they may say,
"He is full of himself,"
but the Not-Men know,
don't you? and
isn't it such a shame
how stupid the Men look
to the Not-Men?

So, here's a song for the Men:

If you take a step back from me,
turn inward, consider another man,
consider his flesh and maybe get
just a little frisky thinking of him,
thinking of his fair shoulders and
his bright round bodice and his—
O! Gentlemen! (his firm pleasure),
then you will finally understand
what is good in you, I hope.

I know I'm considering it.
But I have that goddamn DOG
in me. That's what you need, Man.
You need a bit of a good boy in you.
You need a bit of what you long to be a bit in others.
Like me, you need to cultivate a bit of GOD in you.

A bit of flesh, a scrap of muse.
You ought to, Man, seek what is good in you.
Travel to the depths of your shame, if you must.
Travel to the height of love.
Man, you are not living if you cannot
cry at the sight of another Man.
Man, you are not living if you cannot
cry at the sight of another Man living.

No one belongs to you
my sweet, sweet darling
and you belong to no one.

When I say, I wanna
war-cry for the muses in us,
don't I mean precisely what I mean?

I'm not screaming. I'm not yelling.
I'm not chanting. I'm not calling.

I'm crying.

And I wouldn't DO it if it wasn't ME.

Now, I am not a Man, but I consider them
often from a Great Distance
where I may watch them closely
and wonder why they act that way.

Man, why do you act that way?
Why, Man, are you so lonely?
Is it years of intellectual abuse?

STOP ABUSING YOURSELF, MAN.

I'll love you, if no one else will; I'll
come down to you in a bubble, dawg,
and I'll war-cry for the muses in ya.

I'll cradle you and tell you that, yeah,
what you did was shitty, but it doesn't
mean you can't become a better animal.

I'll hug you consensually and offer
to get coffee with you on the weekends
and discuss our emotions and shit like men.

Like men. We'll discuss our emotions and
we'll discuss sex without baggage and
we'll discuss the news and the war and
we'll discuss community and hope and
we'll hopefully not discuss sports and
we'll hopefully find a better way
to know ourselves.

Sound good?
(call me, k?)

---

Author’s Note: Despite your presumptions, this is not a sequel to my poem from last month. It is, if anything, a remix. The Symp endures. Stay tuned another day for the next tale of the Violet Cycle: The Forgotten God. Love ye!