his face
comes a calling
at this warm woeful place,
to give  me a gruff and galling
mauling

——————

Cinquain/IX was inspired by this photograph of Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier taken by John Shearer for LIFE magazine in 1971  before “The Fight of the Century”, in which Ali lost the heavyweight title to Frazier.  I have plans to write an essay about this image and its relation to self-inflicted psychological warfare when time permits.