Giants use Collin’s arm to beat aggressive Steelers
Wednesday, January 3, 2001
When all else failed us we tore off his arm,
Patrick Kelly
and that was enough because we love him.
We have known nothing else in this life but
this terrible brutality. Enemies
must be beaten, but who is willing
to pay the price? Collins, apparently.
He’s lucky to still have one arm left.
In the old days it would have
taken more, an arm and a leg.
Such cruelty, I know, is normally unthinkable
except against someone we love.
Strangers get better treatment
until we discover a way
to hurt them too. By today’s standards,
that’s called irony, although at one time
it was just being mean. A giant person
should have a giant heart, but inside
we are all so small. We love Collins which is why
he could be hurt. It’s the only way to keep him close.
Look, he weeps but he stays.
The author is a member of the Kelly Writers House Planning Committee.
This is the last in a year-end series of commissioned poems based on Inquirer headlines.