Tuesday 5.24.22

April 4th, 2015

It usually happens as I enter the gym.
The mayhem engulfs me. Like the schoolyard
of my youth,
the noise and music are loud, compelling,
touching something inside that is primal.
Bodies in motion. Sweat in the air. Animals at work.
The senses are quickly primed and ready.
One particular image emerges often. My mind rolls back
through centuries of time to a hot, dusty plain
somewhere in the ancient Roman Empire.
Maybe, … my people in Sicily?
Gladiators stand tall, quiet,
and defiant in the heat of the sun.
The tigers growl unfed and waiting.
And I am somewhere in their midst,
standing on the hot sand
of the amphitheatre floor
breathing hard, sun in my eyes,
the roar of the crowd
running right through my head.
And then, suddenly the daydream ends.
I am brought forward a couple of thousand years
to this night in the gym.
The music blares. The plates bang down.
The visible struggle within each of us,
shared with all our collective senses,
to be something more
than what we are.
It’s brutal in a different way.
But, unlike my relatives from long ago,
no one will die tonite.

August 15, 2014

It’s hard to know where the titles come from.
Out of nowhere. Or, from somewhere
long forgotten. This one appeared during a hard session
of volume work, grunting through some back squats
like a sweaty warthog having a bad day. Emerging
from some childhood recess in my brain,
triggered by who knows what (?), I recall
this title of a hymn, sung by an eight year old
practitioner of prayer, standing lonely and alone
amidst the loud congregation members
petitioning urgently to their Lord.
This was the Scottish Presbyterian church
where I was sent to “to get some structure”
for my life. My parents didn’t go. Just me–
a little chubby Italian elephant, out of place,
and hiding at the feet of the loud sonorous
indifferent adults in this house of righteous song,
along with my barely perceptible squeaks
of chorus. But, now I realize
what a gift they gave me. To accept all of
my bodily music. How special is this corporeal feat
of motion and sound in the gym. Not a PR,
but something just as good. As Walt Whitman
would say, I’m celebrating myself today.
I’m in the church of the body.

July 26, 2015

I’m wondering if I am
alone about this.
What do you do
after a session of heavy back squats?
Go home and sleep? Go for a run?
Go fishing? Make love?
Have a margarita?
(I did, once. Never again.)
Or, just congratulate yourself
that the ordeal is over.
Where I’m likely to be found
is sitting
in front of a bowl
of Whole Foods meatballs,
scarfing down my protein
like a dog in heat,
this incredibly powerful hungriness
sweeping over me.
My brain is screaming—EAT!
The furnace is on blast mode,
as if a switch has been thrown.
I need to do something
to turn it off.
So, I rehydrate with a beer,
and send those meatballs deep down
into the muscle protein factory.
Go, be fruitful and multiply!
Ah, what a satisfying Sunday.
Bon appetit, and stay hungry
my fellow post-squatters!

June 10th, 2016

She doesn’t extoll the virtues of
our gym work,
wringing grimaces
of boredom and pain
from family members,
like I do.
She doesn’t write down her results
or do bar math.
She doesn’t remember what squat weight
she did last week,
or waste time
with the fine points of deadlifting.
She doesn’t record PR’s.
She doesn’t watch the action
in the gym like I do,
screaming silently “yes!”
when I see a good one.
She doesn’t check out
the Instagram pics.
But, I know she is a Crossfitter
because when we miss a session,
she says,  “I don’t feel right today. I need to move
and do some work.”
Ah… the sound of music in my ears!