In Praise of Prey

By LESLIE MCGRATH

 

The rhythm of predation is a sine wave.

Between predator and prey it winds

 

like a whip-crack in slow motion.

The time has come to praise the prey

 

who fill the guts of the never-satisfied

for whom winning is all, and nothing.

 

Praise the squeak and the telling tremble.

Praise their begging and their shame.

 

Praise their jugular fullness, the sweet red pulse

the ever-open spigot of their submission.

 

Let go the lamentations. Let go the pity.

 

All hail the awkward and the addlebrained

the boneheaded, the broken-down, the bonkers.

 

All hail the cracked and the cuckoo

the lame, the lunatic, and the losers.

 

Here’s to the nutjobs, the spastic

the peculiar and the outcasts.

 

For them, the wedgie and the booby prize

the tar, the feathers and the narrow rail.

 

Tip your jaw and let praise fall for prey.

History is written on the vellum of their bellies.

 

 

Leslie McGrath is the author of Opulent Hunger, Opulent Rage, a poetry collection, and the forthcoming Out From the Pleiades: a picaresque novella in verse. 

Listen to Leslie McGrath and Valerie Duff discuss “In Praise of Prey” on our Contributors in Conversation podcast.

[Click here to purchase your copy of Issue 07]

In Praise of Prey

Related Posts

black and white photo of a slim man's body, arm outstretched from the bbody

LitFest 2025 Excerpts: Video Poems by Paisley Rekdal

PAISLEY REKDAL
On the seventh day / of the seventh month, magpies / bridge in a cluster of black and white // the Sky King crosses to meet his Queen, time tracked / by the close-knit wheeling / of stars. I watch. You come // to me tonight, drunk on wine / and cards, nails ridged black / with opium

Mantra 5

KRIKOR BELEDIAN
from channel to channel / the lengthening beauty of shadows that float and bow down / and suck at the stones and planks / of the damp, bitter fog / of loneliness, / stone horses let loose their golden neighs / and the waters transform to / stained glass

Book cover of Concerning the Angels by Rafael Alberti

January 2025 Poetry Feature #2: Rafael Alberti in Translation

RAFAEL ALBERTI
Who are you, tell us, who do not remember you / from earth or from heaven? // Your shadow—tell us—is from what space? / What light, say it, has reached / into our realm? // Where do you come from, tell us, / shadow without words, / that we don’t remember you?