He looks like a fighter who has lost.
He stares at the camera somewhat off kilter,
somewhat dazed, somewhat prepared to pound
the bejesus out of you. His hand rests before him,
swollen, as if it had been punching all his life.
His head rests on the hospital bed iron frame
and the bed light behind him only serves to
illuminate that which radiates from him.

Bloody, but unbowed, I come from a line
that proudly claims to rise from defeat—
I see it in his eyes, they say it,
“I must be true.”

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