O:JA&L Poetry: All forms & styles
Sean Wang
RING WORK
Click on the title TWIN BEAMS to explore or download SEAN WANG’S free PDF in the O:JA&L Broadside Series.
Sun inks the gelding, ribs print,
shade sliding like a first pull.
The rider swings down; leather speaks,
one word, then quiet.
I take the cannon bone, read by touch.
Along the tendon: three seams,
a child’s thumb once pressed,
cloth polished one to gloss,
another mouths the air, unfinished.
No one mounts. On the rail, a gag bit
has chewed the paint to flakes.
Dung salts the air, iron-sour.
Men at the fence lift shirts, show welts,
boast seats stitched forever; they thread their talk,
looping it through the same small holes.
A saddle is for sitting, I say.
Depends whose weight, they say.
My backside’s for the latrine, I say,
and someone laughs, hard.
Then the joint of years: same ring, same dust.
Half my life I shined their buckles,
carried the pail behind their jokes,
cold letters of metal in my hands,
learning the alphabet of pressure.
Stand up, the trainer drums the pad.
The kids tilt faces for praise.
The gelding lowers his warm fetlock
into my open palm, careful, exact.
Not carpentry, setting type,
platen to forme, the touch before force,
a clean first proof in skin. The kids grin;
scatter is only sand; it misses their boots.
I wipe my palm, a brown crescent on denim.
Sun tattoos his back again. What holds
holds by hide, heat, and light, black strokes
shifting with his ribs. All we amount to
is pressure and residue: a faint raised line,
a binding mark legible where the hair lies down.
About the writer:
Sean Wang is a poet and PhD student. His recent work appears or is forthcoming in Cerasus Poetry Magazine, Remington Review, Stone Poetry Quarterly, Eunoia Review, and others.
Image: Balanced Action (AI-assisted digital image) by O:JA&L staff creative. 2025. Public domain via Midjourney AI.
OJAL Art Incorporated, publishing since 2017 as OPEN: Journal of Arts & Letters (O:JA&L) and its imprints Buttonhook Press, HOT BUTTON PRESS Contemporary Issues, and HIGH BUTTON PRESS Contemporary Art, supports writers and artists worldwide.
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The Buttonhook Press Masters Series: Brian Clements on Prose Poetry
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The Buttonhook Press Masters Series: Mark Budman on Flash Discourse
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The Buttonhook Press Masters Series: Ray Gonzalez on Prose Poetry
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With an Interview by Associate Editor Pamelyn Casto
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With an Interview by Associate Editor Pamelyn Casto
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With an Interview by Associate Editor Pamelyn Casto
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