After I stumbled through the gauntlet, after they had hit me <br />As hard as they could, <br />Some there only because there was someone else <br />To be brought in, I joined them <br />In greeting the new ones, the frightened and longing ones, <br />And I punched as hard and as much as I could, something <br />Filling in me I would tell you was a thrill <br />Only because I had no better word for it. <br />There was another word for it: violence <br />Made my mother impatient with me, she would call me evil, <br />And I knew what she was trying to talk to me about— <br />How much I hated, <br />How much I wanted and how greedy wanting made me. <br />What I wanted most were better words.<br /><br />Forrest Hamer<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/initiation-8/
