in the parking lot of the slaughterhouse
then in the dressing room
in a hamper
filled with dirty uniforms.
He puked again on the concrete killing floor
bent at the waist
hands on his knees
and said “Shitfuck.”
Each time a small volcano of yellow liquid
exploded in strings from his cracked lips.
“You going to be okay?” I said.
“No” he said and wretched.
He was still half-drunk
though he’d promised himself
he wouldn’t drink before the match.
It was Saturday morning and he was 193 pounds.
At weigh-in on Tuesday night, he needed to be 167.
“Why not wrestle 185?” I said.
“Those bastards are strong” he said.
“You’re strong” I said.
Plumpy was a bear-hugging motherfucker.
He said “Not that strong.”
Those bastards at 185 were coming down from 220.
They ate broiled chicken
and hamburgers they chewed
and spit into napkins
without swallowing
and did push-ups
by the thousands.
Plumpy said “Shitfuck, hell.”
Everyone else on the team dressed in garbage bags
and ran bleachers until their hamstrings cramped
or stayed home and watched Vision Quest
while drinking lemon juice
through an eyedropper.
But Friday night
Plumpy drank Old Milwaukee pounders
and smoked some dope
and tried to get laid
because, he said, beer was a diuretic
and marijuana was fat-free
and getting laid was exercise
and anyway
he’d cut classes all week
to run laps around the gymnasium
in a plastic suit and ski hat.
Twice he’d bolted from Chemistry
to the lav because the laxatives
kicked in at the wrong time.
You can only destroy your health so much
at 16 and a half
with exercise and diet
before better forms of destruction call.
But the beer and the dope and the not getting laid
morphed his brain into an eating machine
into a tapeworm of desire
so we hit McDonald’s
and Plumpy ate
two cheeseburgers and a large fries
and drank a strawberry milkshake
and a Coke the size of his head
with intentions to puke everything back up
but it all tasted so good
and his throat was raw anyway
so he ordered another round
and another.
“Look” someone said “he doesn’t just eat
the cheeseburger, he makes love to the cheeseburger.”
Plumpy stood up and wobbled.
He went home
passed out
and forgot to throw up.
Now
at the slaughterhouse
Plumpy stuck his fingers
down his throat
but nothing came
except strings
of bile and snot.
Down in the basement
Plumpy was my partner on the hide pull.
He was fucking useless
sleeping on the salt bags
resting in the bathroom
gagging like a billy goat eating tin cans.
Then Plumpy disappeared.
On Tuesday afternoon
he showed up for Chemistry
with a garbage bag
under his sweatshirt
and slept face down on his desk
so his cheeks drooped
like melted wax
and the sweat
marched off his forehead
like a clear liquid army.
I walked him to 5th period
so he didn’t drop in the hall
but Tuesday night
in the locker room
butt naked
he stepped on the scale
at 167 pounds
down to the ounce.
“Fucking told you” Plumpy said.
Being young is a miracle:
you spend all day
in the dirt
with a shovel
and the world
refuses your grave.
Shortly after this
Plumpy sprained his left knee
and permanently retired from sports
but not before a local sportswriter
called him
the new Mike Kirkland
Mike Kirkland
who was
more or less
the greatest name
in the history
of Hempfield wrestling.
That night
Plumpy ate an orange
and pinned his opponent
in 39 seconds.
Photo By: Tsutomu Takasu
