Charlie

you fight everything with such futile grace,
like a moth beating its wings
against a lighted window.
in the back room of a locked ward of a
hospital built for broken minds,
you press your face hard against the
cold glass of your shatterproof window
but it will not yield to tears.

in the anesthetic silence you
wage your secret war.
you are both the white army
and the black, with your kings locked
in a mutual checkmate- make a move
and both of them will fall. in your mind
the end of days is written in the spilled
rice pudding on the floor
and every sunrise is a new apocalypse.

the doctors, with small white pills
promise to deliver you from wonderland,
but you can't leave this darkening dream.
your night cigarette, under the watchful eye of nurses
is a beautiful thing to behold;
with it you flick sparks off into the night,
tragic fireworks sent high and bright and gold;
tiny stars swept away by the wind to freedom.

Comments & reviews · 5
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User avatar
Wiggy
Review
Wiggy wrote a review · Tue Aug 29, 2006 7:44 pm

I really liked this poem. Was this perhaps inspired by Flowers for Algernon? It's such a sad movie!!!!! You do have great talent, and I'm sure with the suggestons already stated, your poem will go from perfect to perfecto! :D

User avatar
xanthan gum
Review

in the back room of a locked ward of a

Cut an "of"

rice pudding on the floor

Why rice pudding?

In any case, it's all very beautiful. It took you an awful while to meet your point, but I suppose I'm just impatient. My only suggestion is that you roam outside the prose-text...as I can see that you are already very skilled here and in no need of improving.

User avatar
Cassandra
Review

I'll have to disagree about the capitalization. I think you definitely need to capitialize the first letter of every stanza, plus whenever you begin a new sentence, but don't capitalize every line. Poetry is almost in its own hemisphere. A lot of times it can be an exception to regular mechanics.

Other than that, nice work. As black apple said, great imagery. I especially liked this part:

your night cigarette, under the watchful eye of nurses
is a beautiful thing to behold;
with it you flick sparks off into the night,
tragic fireworks sent high and bright and gold;
tiny stars swept away by the wind to freedom.


If I may ask, what was your inspiration for this poem?

User avatar
black apple
Comment

I would use capitals at all times when nessesary. It makes it less confusing imo. Other than that, the imagery is quite rich and it's not difficult to understand so...I think it's a really nice piece of work.



cron
As a former (and rather excellent) liar herself, Aru knew that, sometimes, speaking the truth felt like wrenching a thorn out of your side. But doing the opposite meant pretending it wasn't there. And that made every single step ache. It was no way to live.
— Roshani Chokshi, Aru Shah and the Nectar of Immortality