I once believed I could hate intermittently,
an incandescence I could turn on and off
with the will or guide with the pressure
of my knees or with reins woven
from the clear demands of the moment.
I believed hatred could be trained,
that it could heel beside me, unmuzzled
and awaiting command, and would
not suddenly lash out at passing strangers
driven by ancestral hungers.
At the very least, I believed I’d summoned
my hatred into being as a rational act,
rather than playing dumb host to its cordyceps
matting in and maddening me until I behaved
like any other similarly infected.
Devon Balwit, author of Dog-Walking in the Shadow of Pyongyang, lives in Portland, Ore.
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