the thin glass
by Livi Thrasher

Runestone, volume 12

drop & pawn the puck off for sweet aim

    this white-sweatered man slides for the steal

but this is my home. we bump & snarl, our

     shoulders bulging under soft armor. we want it for 

skin. before, we dress & assume ego in green, jerseys 

     pulled over heads, where i am him & he me. to pawn

yourself to the game religionizes the locker room, is

     purgatory: replay the entrance and recede, relive slips,

reach to forgive & to earn it. kiss foes with violence,

     kiss brothers with time. check my guy, force him to 

his knees? drop gloves, swoop-slam down, spine to ice. 

     fight into a gentle slide. blood from our mouths, life for 

the ice to swish & swallow, burn. child palms pound the glass—

     even they lust for cheap spillage. each game is new fight, white stage 

to sweat glory. his eyes & mine, bounded in visor glarings; the tint

     disrupts some anger. we will hanker this blood, this youth, & still 

i choke out closeness with a sinner’s fury. i am him

     & not: our home in this hunger, to matter forever.