Have You Ever Been in a Fight?
When you date a man
one of the first things
is to find out how many fights
he’s been in, how many times
he’s put up his fists,
put his hard hands
on another man.
When they talk about this
they reveal themselves.
There are men who hate
themselves and the world.
Men who invite violence
to fall down on them.
Who take pride
in having broken
someone’s nose, who take
grim pride in having
broken someone’s nose.
There are men who see no difference
between world violence
and home violence, who know
the stages of bruise, broken
bone, concussion. They carry
weapons they’ve bought,
weapons they’ve made.
They look for weapons in the world.
What they’re telling you
is whether they can love you.
*
Sara Eddy’s full-length collection, Ordinary Fissures, was released by Kelsay Books in May 2024. She is also the author of two chapbooks (Tell the Bees, A3 Press, 2019, and Full Mouth, Finishing Line Press, 2020), and her poems have appeared in many online and print journals, including Threepenny Review, Raleigh Review, Sky Island, and Baltimore Review, among others. She lives in Amherst, Massachusetts, in a house built by Emily Dickinson’s cousin.
From The Archives: Published on This Day
- Sentences 294-300 by Scott Ferry (2023)
- Three Poems by CL Bledsoe (2023)
- Two Poems by Miriam Levine (2022)
- Hide-and-Seek by Erin Murphy (2021)
You do such a service when you integrate truth and poetry. As poet and clinical social worker, I believe it doubles the impact – thank you!