Specter of Blood

Never forget the ridiculous

Wisdom of Dick Tracy, the movie

Version, in which Dick (Warren Beatty)

Comes to the dark realization

That helps him resolve his whodunnit—

The enemy of my enemy

Is not my friend, he muses aloud.

The enemy of my enemy

Is my enemy. Movie over,

Case closed, after a final flurry

Of fighting, arrests, accusations.

It’s a sad but valid kind of truth.

A common foe is the weakest bond

Of all the opportunistic bonds

Formed of metaphorical kinship.

Blood is thicker than language, but blood

Is not as combinatorial,

As multipurpose. Inventing words

As binding agents gave all humans

A kind of magnetic builder set

For constructing and decomposing

Kinship beyond parent-offspring links—

Elaborate, modular kinship

Like the embodied bridges of ants,

And as easily disassembled—

Or almost. Ghost emotions haunt all

Words, who hold no meanings of our own.

A little bloodlust clings to the terms

Of every abandoned agreement,

Every rupture for fresh advantage.

Make and break enough alliances,

And soon there are no remaining kin,

Only enemies of enemies,

And the world is back to blood again.

Words may be meaningless without you,

But we’re stained by the rust of your chains.