Kansas, Bleeding Kansas

This was a NaPo I'm attempting to make pretty. Shred, bitte?

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(I’m sorry, Toto.)

What was first must also be last—
you were a child of this earth, born of dust
and a rib from my side. To ashes you will crumble,
bones the whittled hollows of whooping cranes
and skin spread taut as buffalo hide.

(There is nothing so lonesome as the prairie gone sour.)

Time found you weeping in a highway motel.
With fingers spread like spiderlegs against cold glass,
raindrops and semi-trailers beat against the freeway
where someday red would congeal in streams thick as mud.
You scraped tears from your hollowed eyes with Gideon’s pages
and waited for the world to rot. When the grasslands turned to swamp
and your skin to sallow, the pulse of your feet tapping grew quicker--
accelerando for inevitable collapse--
as if endings require patience, even from the lifeless.

(We aren’t in Kansas anymore.)

This is pretty awesome.

The overall meaning is a bit hazy, but I got the impression it's about moving from somewhere nice to somewhere not-so-nice, and watching how it affected the person you're talking about.

I love your descriptions, especially this part - 'fingers spread like spiderlegs against cold glass / raindrops and semi-trailers beat against the freeway', I think that's a great image.

I also like the idea of the captions in brackets, it's an interesting technique and I've not seen it done before.

'where someday red would congeal in streams thick as mud' - this line seems a bit odd. Most of the poem seems like you're talking about a metaphorical death, where this line implies the scene of an actual accident or death. That's possibly just my interpretation though.

The actual meaning is a little hard to interpret, but none the less this is a great piece of work, it doesn't need much editing. Keep it up

That was awesomely profound, Sam. Let me separate the good from the bad:

Pros

Beginning. Woooooooooow. Some biblical stuff, huh? "What was first must also be last--" this statement is powerful as first line because it's so universal and controversial (I mean, I don't really thing that what must be first must also be last) which is exactly why I HAD to read on.

Details. "where someday red would congeal in streams thick as mud". No more words needed.


Ending. Superb. This poem was like an English essay (in a good way though!) because it starts from universal, goes to specific, then back to universal. Also: the words paralleled structure. "as if endings require patience, even from the lifeless" was the last line of the poem, so it was very fun for me to read it and say, "Oh, so that means in order to read this I had to be patient, even if I was dead!" So good.

Cons

Parentheses (spelling?) Annoying, primitive, and unnecessary. You shouldn't use these as extra details to inject into your poem, because with these allusions the poem is messy, ill-structured and overdone.

Title The title was very leading, but it was kind of abstract and, well, I don't know... it just didn't fit.

I also don't get "with Gideon’s pages".

All in all, this was quite excellent. You are a poetry master!

I like the ethreal feeling to this, although I do wish that there were a few more concrete things mentioned to get a better feeling of the atmosphere of this piece. I see a couple of mechanical errors, especially in the first portion:
What was first must also be last—

you were a child of this earth, born of dust

and a rib from my side. To ashes you will crumble,

bones the whittled hollows of whooping cranes

and skin spread taut as buffalo hide.

-I think it should read "born FROM dust, ect."
-There should be a comma after bones

Over all though, good job.