JL - POEMS

JL is an Arizona based poet who enjoys going to the occasional bodybuilding show. He has worked as a substitute teacher, an ice cream scooper, a mosquito repellent salesman and a number of other jobs. He currently works at a grocery store and writes in his free time.

Ronnie Coleman
                    -after Ronnie Coleman
​

People tell me all the time
             they want to compete, want to pop
                    their pecs on the Mr. Olympia stage,
 
but none of these clowns
             want to lift that heavy-ass weight—       
                     weights that make your triceps
 
tremble, like chihuahuas
             shaking at the sight of their own shadows.
                     Most of you are scared
 
of looking like a fool
             in the gym, yelping for help
                     when the weight on the bench
 
proves too heavy
             for your skinny-ass, toothpick arms.
                     But guess what,
 
when I first hit the gym,
             I could barely curl a 25-pound dumbbell,
                    slinkied to the ground
 
when I tried to deadlift      
            double my body weight.
                       But I got big because I never felt scared
 
of lifting a weight above my head
            that could crush my skull,
                    like a grape between my massive molars.
 
Sure, buddy, I may never walk again--
           my knees more splintered
                 than the wood in Gold’s Gym,
 
my spaghetti tendons a mess
           of knots and tears.
                But I’ll never regret lifting all that weight,
 
never regret feeling my joints
            sandpaper against one another
                   as I lifted weight after weight
 
with my giant, pulsing muscles--
             muscles so big and black that if you stood
                      in front of me, I could flex
 
and blot out the sun.

The Austrian Oak
                        -after 1969 Schwarzenegger
​

When I step on stage, I feel like a God--
light bulbs flashing, women with their mouths open
like big blonde goldfish, thinking, Arnold,
 
please notice me! How did I get so strong,
so determined? I focused on my weak points:
hit my delts if my shoulders were looking
 
more like turtle shells than football pads;
hit squats for two hours if I needed my quads
to blow up like rocket ships.
 
I never let anything get in the way of me and the iron:
even as a teen I would sneak into the gym
after it closed, curling weight after weight
 
until my blood stained the grooves of the grip.
You see, no one can stop the Austrian Oak
from being crowned Mr. Olympia. Not Mentzer
 
and his girly words, whose mustache looks
more like two poodles pushing their noses together
than a strongman stache. Not, Lou and his dumb
 
rotini-shaped hair swaying back and forth
when he steps on stage. Not even my father
who would burst into my room at odd hours
 
in the night, and beat the shit out of me,
thinking I was gay because I hung pictures
of the body-builders I admired on the wall--
 
their bronzed bodies posing on the beach
like towering sandcastles, their white smiles
flashing through the dark foam.
 
 

​Spray-Tan

​It takes a little getting used to:
the spray-on tans, the dayglo goo
slathered on the night before.
 
But let me set the record straight:
of course, the spray-on tan looks fake,
we bronze ourselves all over
 
to accentuate the Grand Canyon of our abs,
the grainy texture of our backs,
not because we want to look
 
like we’ve spent too much time
roasting like a walnut in the oven.
It takes a painter’s eye
 
to get the color just right--
not just any chump can get
the tone and hue we need.
 
It’s more circus peanut than the Kraft
macaroni and cheese
your mom served you
 
when your family was broke.
It’s like just-plucked saffron
mixed with a hint of Sunny Delight. 
 
Some would say it’s trophy-colored,
that as we prepare to hit
our most muscular pose
 
we become the thing we want the most.
But I would say the color
is more a molten-orange--
 
that if I paint myself to perfection,
my planet-sized muscles
will blaze like stars
 
on that night-black Mr. Olympia stage.