Why It Hurts So Much
Paul Hostovsky

Because the pain was already in the body
the way the figure was already in the wood
before the knife revealed it

the body like a pile of splinters
growing around the glinting pain

the pain asserting itself like a birth
the body crumbling
falling away like a death

the pain was in the body
long before the body was in pain
long before the body was a body
the pain was there

and in the body before that body

the figure in the wood was in the tree
and in the tree before that tree

the pain is very old
much older than the body

which is why it hurts so much
and why the body cannot hold it