Here is a wonderful poem by Carrie Oeding that was featured in a recent issue of the Denver Quarterly.
Inside a Map of Arnold Schwarzeneggar’s Arm
I map my arm as if it can be a map, too.
I want to see my arm inside of his,
to arm wrestle for territory with his best arm, his younger one,
his arm that can’t move while I map mine inside.
I will never contain the secret to mind-blowing arms
within this map of my arm inside his, but every map has resources.
To know my house, I make a map of all of its blue.
To understand my potential,
I make a map of tomorrow and navigate it when the real day
happens,
but my map and the real day never match.
How to approach tomorrow takes a long time.
About the same time it takes to find everything blue in my house,
which is not as long as it takes to build up great arms.
For something that requires a lot of time, pumping iron really lacks
mystery.
You either work on your arms, or you don’t—you know how it goes.
I love the map of my arm inside Arnold’s, because there is nowhere
to go.
Like being in a room built entirely for blue things. Like building a
house, a tiny house just around the top of my house, around
the weather vane, where you go up and visit and just look at it,
without the weather to direct it.
* poem from Denver Quarterly, Vol. 48, No. 2, 2014.
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