Killing a Bull

Toshi Casey

“I repeat women shouldn’t fight bulls because a b u l l f i g h t e r is and always should be a man.”— Paco Camino, March 26, 1972, Eugene Register Guard.

Curiosity and feminism drove me to watch

a matador over the internet on a live-feed,

for I do not live where matadors stalk the vigorous streets

crowded with blue-egg buildings

painted against the smell of roasted olives

or Tuscany bread.

I do not live where men march to an arena to kill bulls, or where

a woman like me leans over her railings,

throws a carnation at the feet of a man,

and falls in love, but I wonder how I might kill a beast—

what is the gore infested consequence

of my ritual, my spectacle?

If I startle, hook, pierce, flourish paces

till the last snort raises dirt,

lean in and drive out the heart of the thing,

I might be able to tell Camino that he is wrong

and vindicate my gender,

except I don’t want to fight a bull

inside of a bullring with nine other women at my side.

Personal responsibly roped out between the unit,

allowing the ten of us enough room to dance.

I’d rather wait until he loved me enough to close his eyes,

so we’d have to be on speaking terms.

He could dream his beastly, primitive dreams

of fucking cows and scraping his rump against tree bark,

or goring his horns into rival bull hide.

Once at peace, I’d pull my long blade against his rough throat,

drink my fill in his round bull’s eye,

and sick myself on his thick blood.

So, perhaps, Paco is right.

Perhaps women should not fight bulls.

I’d murder without grace or twirled fringe amid the throng.

For me death would be personal:

a frothing tongue and the kind of suffering

that takes me down with it in a final moment

and divvies us both up between the hungry.