Ooh, I feel so special. On my fourth page of the thread now. XD
21 April
And to imagine that we know so much of love.
Whispering our secrets out of lips only
A few times kissed—or never kissed.
Wondering at the mechanics
Of a man's mind. Wondering whether
Those we love in our dreams are
Men yet, or really just boys—
Because we are girls still: hair pulled back,
soft voices, unkissed but for a few times
when we imagined we knew so much of love.
"My pet, I've been to the devil, and he's a very dull fellow. I won't go there again, even for you..."
Einstein taught us that light is dualistic,
that it may be waves and it may be particles,
but who am I to tell the difference—
I wrangle little from physics,
a little more from poetry,
but the most from the way the clouded sun
reaches so softly into my little room
and steps its two feet all around the walls.
"My pet, I've been to the devil, and he's a very dull fellow. I won't go there again, even for you..."
Strange to think that I would take advice from a villain,
but in the first act he tells us that our bodies are our gardens,
to plant as we please. A small line, insignificant as far
as my understanding of the play goes.
But I like it nonetheless. I wish I might plant flowers
for love in my garden, which I will watch over and water
and weed until the days grow too cold for blossoms.
"My pet, I've been to the devil, and he's a very dull fellow. I won't go there again, even for you..."
It is the first roller-skating party for the third grade.
I am here to tie knots in laces, keep the children
sitting against the blue gymnasium walls, and hold hands
as one hundred eight-year-olds find what it is
to navigate with wheels on their feet.
Noah is a quiet one, not very fast, but not a
frequent faller. I offer my hand; he is not like the other
boys, who insist on falling alone, and he takes it.
He lets me pull him along, testing his own balance,
Every time he feels he is doing well,
he raises his hands above his head
in triumph, never quite realizing that this action upsets
his carefully earned balance.
He collapses back down to the floor,
put there by his own confidence,
wheels spinning out from the soles of his feet.
"My pet, I've been to the devil, and he's a very dull fellow. I won't go there again, even for you..."
Late. TV on in the living room. The wife walks out,
asks him to come to bed. Some little monster
reaches up out of his stomach and seizes his throat.
Neither one of them will say it, but something's
smashed into the air between them. Something's
fluttered a little bit in her chest, and she knows that
there's a dead love curled up in a dusty corner
of the house. The walls blink on and off as the TV
flickers. The air smells a little stale. She wraps her
robe a little tighter. He still doesn't respond.
"My pet, I've been to the devil, and he's a very dull fellow. I won't go there again, even for you..."
When I was young my mother took me down
to the graveyard at the end of our dirt road.
A small place, for the dead of a small town,
And to me the dead my mother showed.
Angels and crosses all carved into the stone,
marking where the dead like seeds were sown.
"My pet, I've been to the devil, and he's a very dull fellow. I won't go there again, even for you..."
27: This is good and flows well. I really love the last line, and the third. I'm not sure about the fourth line, it sounds a little forced. Maybe try something like;
"Where corpses languished in their soil abodes", something where the syntax isn't twisted, and preferably something where you don't repeat "the dead", as you say it a lot for such a short poem.
26: I really love this one. The tension is well expressed, and your imagery is great, especially;
"there's a dead love curled up in a dusty corner".
"The walls blink on and off "
The last two lines are really powerful and your variation between sentence length is very effective.
25: I really like this one actually, especially the end, and the description is great. The only line I wasn't sure about was;
"to navigate with wheels on their feet."
I think "With wheels on their feet" is a little clunky.
24: I love the first stanza. It's very fresh, and the first two lines are really powerful. I'm not too sure about the next stanza...though this may be more as a result of my own pessimism than your poetry. It felt a little weak, especially "But I like it nonetheless". and "I wish I might". I think these phrases were a little too wordy or something, maybe flimsy?
23: This one is really great. I love the theme and how you express yourself. My only suggestion is that you change the last lien to;
"and stretches its feet all around the walls",
as "steps" and "two feet" sounded a bit like spoon-feeding the reader.
22: Interesting idea, well expressed, and I love the internal rhyme in the last line.
21: This wasn't my favourite, but that may be because I'm not much of a love poetry person... I thought;
"unkissed but for a few times
when we imagined we knew so much of love."
were very good ending lines.
Jas
"Just like moons and like suns, With the certainty of tides, Just like hopes springing high, Still I'll rise." -Maya Angelou
ha! I've caught you in the library
wedged between the magazines
and the biographies,
and I wish pretty bad right now
that you'd just walk over
and take the book I've been
using to hide my bitten lip and
my nose-like-a-collapsed-volcano.
I wish you'd toss that book over
one of our shoulders,
because I didn't like
reading it much anyhow—
tell me you think my nose is just fine
and wrap your arms around me,
my stained jacket and all,
book-jacket to me.
"My pet, I've been to the devil, and he's a very dull fellow. I won't go there again, even for you..."
I like the "ha! I've caught you" at the beginning because it sets such a fanciful mood for the rest of the poem, and I like the idea that he's a book jacket. This one's cute ^_^
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