What Rough Beast | Poem for November 26, 2018

Scott Hightower
PIGS ALL THE WAY DOWN

(Sept. 27, 2018)

Among the children of wealth
and license is a subset that reaps
social capital for heedlessly
misbehaving. Oh, how a certain

class of men do guard
and perpetuate their privileges. Even
back to the ancients there have been
records of bursts of incandescent

fury: hot messes and another
subset that exerts steely
self-control. Even Poe
liked drinking

with the Fordham Jesuits.
Boys like their games, hunting
dens, and hideouts; instinctively
know where there are safe havens;

when to close ranks; when
to try dodging a line of inquiry
by burying their “white” lies
in an avalanche of distracting

compulsive qualifications.
(Though, careful. Compulsive
qualifications can be telling.)
Years and the formality of oaths

have a way of complicating
foolery and deception:
incoherent drunkenness,
unkind aggressive belligerency…

from a blurry refusal of a slurred “No,”
to a steely-eyed refusal of a handshake.
All was vanity and vexation of spirit,
and there was no profit under the sun.



Scott Hightower is the author of four books of poetry in the US and two bilingual collections published in Madrid. He lives in Manhattan and teaches
at New York University’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study.

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