Gold for Fools

He came around here

Dragging that woman

Like she was stubborn cattle

So when she did what she did

I felt no animosity towards her

You should have seen him
Kicking at her
And pulling her hair

Disgraceful

To behave that way

Other men

Other men have acted as such

But none in front of others

None in a way

That would humiliate their—

My wife would look at me

And I would tell her with my eyes

I would tell her

You're lucky

That I don't treat you in such a way

In front of people

Or behind closed doors

I wasn't raised

To harm women

Or treat them

Like nothing

And that man
Beat into everything
He could lay his hands on

He would hurt

Anything he could hurt

He didn't respect life

Of any kind

So when they found his body

Well—the parts

I thought—

Darkness will bring you to darkness

And violence will render you

Nothing

But blood and brokenness

Even still

His screams...

They all come out here

Men like that

Looking for gold

And we

We who have resided her now for—

Some of us

Going on many years

We watch them

These men

These men who love a strike

Who love a switch

Who love the quick feelings that come

From only staring at themselves

And the skin they decide to scrape

We watch these men

And pray for them

But when they go their way

And don't return

We stop praying for them

And we pray for ourselves instead

Because the line

Between a man like that

And a man like myself

A man who shows his wife kindness
And gives her peace of mind

Well—

It's a fragile line

It's not as strong

As I, or—

Many of us

Would like

We're fools, all of us

And who we are

Is circumstance

It is situational

That man took his wife

To the brink of death

The night he disappeared

Because she had burned his dinner

We heard the woman begging

But we didn't intervene

Because a bad marriage

Is a parade of wolves

You don't look

You observe

And you don’t interfere

We knew what would come later

We had seen it happen before

The man finished with his wife

And went his way

And the women…

They went after him

To this day, I hear his screams
Echoing in my darkest thoughts

And I wonder, sometimes

What they did to him

They came back with clean faces
And stained clothes

And my wife handed me a knife

And told me to bury it in the ground

It was our turn

To use a knife

And now we would need a new one

It's necessary

All of it

It's what we do for the community

There are those who come here

Who find what they seek

But it does not make them

Any less foolish

The gold will buy you everything

But a map to compassion

A compass to your own humanity

The women sit around the fire

And laugh

Not pray

Nothing to ask for

Not even forgiveness