SQUATS : peter spiro
Here is not where men and boys are separated
but where the ordinary becomes audacious,
where summer storms turn into tornadoes.. And if we talk
in terms of weather, then this is the weightlifter’s hurricane,
quads and calves like turbulent gusts of muscle whipped
around the eye of the knee.
You step up to the rack, square off facing a cracked plaster wall
or a mirror hung there to display what will soon be
your face in a grimace of agony.
Grip the bar, lean into it, bend the neck till the head
slips under and you feel the cold steel across your shoulders.
Dig in beneath the weight, measure each breath, straighten slowly
as you lift it off the rack; step back, stand for a moment
to ensure the bar’s securely balanced. Now squat.
Each quad fills with a rush of blood then swells as you start to stand.
Straight up, back tight, head and neck stiff, as if
you were skewered through form heel to forehead, the rump
like a linchpin to control the flow of motion;
down again, then up, your butt
the hub upon which the hips ride, cycling
each rise and dip, knees wrapped tightly to avoid a buckle.
When each thigh is painfully inflamed
the warm-up ends and the work gets real.
You’ve crossed a border from civil inhibition
to a frontier of fear where your sequestered animals
feast on your deep silent secrets.
Up and down in maddening dance,
each repetition pulling you farther form the edge
of that frontier you are now swooping through
like a crazed hawk, flashing and slashing around
sheared cliffs glazed with the blades of a midday sun.
A gust of wind, as if form great wings beating, and you’re lifted
above some steep face of rock, sweeping the sky like a blare
sent up form fields resembling golden sponges.
You’ve crashed the gate, slipped silently through
some dark portal where you hear your own breathing, though
somehow you know you’re not in control. You’re unconscious
but you’re still squatting.
