A Memoir: Remembering Jesse Barton

"You know Frank I
Think I'm supposed to say something like, 'I didn't see it coming,' but
if I said that I would be lyin.
Jesse hadn't been the same at all these past few months.
Just last Saturday you would've found him in his
Kitchen leaning against the counter, holding that
2002 Shooter's Bible of his and
Smokin a cigarette. Since when did that kid start smokin or huntin again?
He hadn't done none of that since we were in high school.
But he was really startin to getting too deep into his own head, though.
Saying stuff like: 'I'm dealin with a verdict and a regret at the same time.'
I mean,
what the hell, Jesse?
I didn't get it, but you just never know sometimes--
people just get like that when it gets tough. I guess with Jesse he
was just losing his mind.

About a week ago--the last time I was over at his place--the
floor tiles in his kitchen had turned all yellow and it was
just a real sorry sight to see. I don't know how it got like that, but the
Cabinet fronts got all warped and the
whole place…man, it just smelled like stale Corona or something.
Like nobody had lived in there for months.
I was startin to feel sorry for em but I didn't really know what I could do to help.
Every time I would ask him, he just
Wanted that blonde girl back. You know--Janie--the one from Kansas, she
Drove that nasty beat up Toyota? Yeah, he still wasn't over it and the girl
left him almost a year ago."

Hello Chevy. This was a very sweet and sad poem. However, I felt as though it read more like a fragmented piece of flash fiction then a poem.
Although I can't exactly put my finger on it, I know that there is a certain quality to your writing style that lacks the lyrical beauty most poems have.
In other matters, you spell 'ing' words without the 'g', and although you might want to make it seem more realistic, you can't do that unless we know what kind of character the narrator is.
Good poem, but it needs alot of revision before I can take it seriously.

Thanks for the review. I actually made an epic mistake and did not upload the latest draft. I changed the suffixes and added a few more details. It's actually a excerpt from a greater project that's really just realistic fiction written in the form of poetry. I've never done anything like this before. I'll be uploading more from it--most likely in this thread.

I have to agree with Elinor, this is not what I would consider poetry, but prose. Just by putting it into stanzas, does not make it poetry. If you were using metaphors and personification or were following some sort of structure like a sonnet or haiku, I would consider this poetry. However, even though it is not poetry, it is very well written and is quite captivating.