Fisticuffs

I’ve never raised a hand in self-defense
Like those mad drunks swinging wild
At the immense blackness that defiled them
Though I inhabit the same hour
And own the same hands
And have scoured the expanding
Darkness in us all
I’ve even been put down myself
I’m not enthralled to tell of it
But it’s happened yet
My hands hung listless
I forget to feel vicious when I get restless
I never grab my fists
To take up the collection
When some stranger twists the wrong inflection
Or casts an insulting eye
From a swiveled head
I never try to beat the dead
Or kill the ghosts inside men’s souls
That taunt us in the wilder hours
The old that haunts with ageless powers

I never found my fighting feet
To stand, to swing, to rage on by
I think it must taste sweet to try
But for the excessive afterthoughts
That drive a man to drink:
A thought worth not the think.