THE MAN WITH NO MASK

THE MAN WITH NO MASK 

When, following the big win- the real biggie- 

uncountable zeros after his name- 

he stands his friends an endless reservoir of stout 

and decrees every church 

a twenty-four-hour shebeen 

abolishes retching and reflux and coughs 

plugs the ancient flow of anal bleeding 

decrees the removal of sleep from the brain 

and promises the people that none 

need ever stop drinking and smoking and snorting 

and gambling and chomping ever again. 

Ten-million-year weekend begins. 

The paralytic age. 

Then. Something mighty 

cracks in the head of the Chieftain of Chiefs, 

an unquenchable surging of rage through the blood 

that cometary rage at being 

not the only God 

and off he goes to war against the world 

grinding armies to dust 

drowning archipelagos 

hurling mountains into the sun 

New York falls to him 

and then the whole of Scotland 

then Bangkok, Bhutan, Yakutsk. 

Finalé – his incredible one-man stampede, 

two legs tied behind, routing 

Skibbereen and Stalingrad, the Black and Tans, the Vietcong 

and Mossad. 

Every last man jack of ‘em. 

Bored and still mad up for it, 

he announces a gang resurrection 

bringing back to the mainland of clay and despair 

Georgie Best and Michael Collins, 

Christy Ring and Elvis. 

One by one, in headlines everywhere, 

he completely defeats them 

at soccer and handball and hurling and dancing 

at head-the-ball, bare knuckle fisting, cock-fights 

and freaking out women. 

Whereupon he finally declares himself 

the Permanent Champion Of Everything. 

Then, to end and begin, outstretched, 

he assumpts himself live onstage in Moonshine Stadium 

kaleidoscopically spinning 

fountaining fireworks 

as he bends to show off 

a shining New Ireland 

emerging from his a-ho like an egg. 

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The Man With No Mask is from my collection Medium.