Death and Violence

Throughout the collection, the author embraces a diverse range of poetic forms in order to explore the simultaneous complexity and ubiquity of death and violence. The author introduces these thematic notions in the poem’s opening piece, “The Bull.” When the speaker encounters the bull “alone in the backyard,” he says that he has “no choice” but to confront him (1). The speaker is moved by the bull’s presence and his livingness: “He kept breathing, / to stay alive. I was a boy— / which meant I was a murderer / of my childhood. & like all murderers, my god / was stillness” (1). In these lines, the speaker identifies himself as a child. However, he simultaneously describes himself as a murderer. The enjambment of the sentence “I was a murderer / of my childhood,” forces the reader to first see the speaker as simply a murderer. Yet in the latter...