What I Did During My Summer Vacation
The romance of a jealous little girl
boils down to certain habits
and expressions, a game to fill up
August days:
her two small hands
stuffing blossoms in-between
encyclopaedia pages,
or somewhere else, easier to find,
when she was feeling
risqué
(or would have been had she only
known how to pronounce it). And if
the bowls on their stems were too
full-bodied to be
preserved so neatly,
between the syrup
and sexual organs masquerading
as hairy hearts of gold --
if instead of drying into a memory
of scent, as planned,
the lovely heads flattened
askew, or worse, cracked, and
stained paper with their unsweetened
vegetable smell -- well, what of it?
Such failures were good practice for life,
when she would need to know how to
invent small torments,
and wash the embarrassments
out from under her finger-nails
as easily as sap.
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141,254 Literary Works • 674,330 Reviews
I have now! Wikipedia is my friend.
And thank you.
This piece is extremely sweet. I wonder if you've ever heard the term "objective correlative" before. Well, regardless of whether you have or have not, you are a master of that technique! I like the smooth way the writing flows because it reveals an innocence in the speaker. This stylistic choice indicates that, although the speaker has gained insight by the final stanza of the poem, he/she is still wholly immersed in childhood, or still green to the workings of romance. You should feel really good about this piece. It would have been easy to drift into a cliche (what, with writing of love and coming-of-age), but you managed to breathe originality and creativity into your writing. I hope to read more of your work, so keep writing!
thankyouthankyouthankyooou.
I will fix 'hairy hearts of gold'; this, I have promised myself. One day. Preferably soon.
Helpful McHelpful! =D <3 =D <3 =D <3 Nom!
I. Little Things
Huh. A little twinge towards something deeper than the crisp narrative, eh? I like this, especially the little description that comes afterward in parentheses, but it needs expansion so it's not just a random comment to up the tone of the piece.
And this addition didn't quite do it for me. It's entirely too vague. At least /I/ can't understand it at all. 'Hearts of gold', yes, but I can't get the image that coincides with the plot in my head. What I mean is, if I tried to read this poem out simply to just tell the story, I wouldn't know what happened here. >_<; It might be because it's late at night, or because I'm stupid, but I would like some clarification if that's at all possible.
This ending was beautiful, except why would there be sap from flower blossoms? Maybe nectar? Maybe shreds of stem? Something else, I think.
II. Overall
The imagery throughout this poem is really lovely and clear. I can see each action as it unfolds (except, of course, for the parts where I got confused) and I love how crisp it displays itself in my head.
Wait, wait, wait, it's clearing up for me as I digest it. Summer romance. Okay, we've all had some of that, I'm sure, then the transition from innocent crushes to discovering sexuality. Regrets. More. Definitely can see the crushed blossoms as intense symbolism and I like it.
I suppose I would suggest clearing up the second image here {the hinted-at sexuality} a little more, to make it just a touch more prevalent in this already beautifully-crafted piece.
Let me know if you have questions. I'm not certain this made sense at all. o_O;
-Hannah-