Men Like Giants

Men Like Giants
by Maggie Wack
This is the monkey’s touch:
you clutch
with sweaty palms, dexterous fingertips,
you say –
let’s dissect.
You are an aggregate
of the obscene
and the profound.
You say, we did not invent this but it is ours: love, hunger,
literature.
You say, where does the soul start? It is like an avalanche,
it accumulates in fragments,
it learns itself
with a disfigured grace.
You say
you have come
to conquer or save me
with all of your fine words
but you cannot – everything
has been done already.
You were born too late by centuries,
they have all come before you
these early men like giants
and stolen your purported
fames –
there is nothing left
for you
to say.