Published August 19, 2006
This is the last time it will be like this.
Leaves crinkling underneath my yielding broom as I
fight the urge to straddle it, flash a wicked grin and
instead of wiping things clean we could both make messes
of ourselves all over again.
But I stand steady, bare feet planted to the sidewalk,
where we, asphalt children, grew beside anorexic lawns.
Memories are engraved in gravel and it feels like a tombstone out here,
late when the sun flickers out like innocent black lights.
You were my ice cream daisy, abloom in soap suds, shared tears
and the worlds we molded from coach cushions and rainy afternoons.
The thing I prize most is how I could make you giggle
(even when father pounded his red fist and when the rooftops could hear
the lightening shrieks of arguments that rattled our identical bones)
Through this, we have grown and here you are:
Toenails abstract, jeans still grass stained with the childhood we shared,
shoulders I once sat on stout, poised. And like a raven of omens,
slung over your body is blackened luggage and the whispers of:
[Goodbye]
Now I know why it hurts when blood leaves the body –
It belongs to somebody else.
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141,285 Literary Works • 674,333 Reviews
XG - I LOVE, ADORE, and ADMIRE this poem immensely. It's one of the best I've read on this site. I even had my roommate read it and we both agree that there's no way you are 14, because 14-year-olds can't write this well. Talk about competition!
Anyway, aside from the praise, I don't have much to add critique-wise. However, give me a day or two to ponder and then perhaps I will have some suggestions.
The first line reminds me of a song by Keane. It's good, I like your one-line way of starting poems.
Yipe, nice! That's a good set of lines, I love it - only thing I'd change is "make messes" to "make a mess"; it just works better against "ourselves" in my opinion.Good imagery (what else do we expect from you!) but it feels a little broken, with all those commas. Now that I look at it again, it doesn't work to badly like that, actually... well, think about how you want it
Damn you're good.
Seems to me that another two line section breaks up the flow a bit too much - perhaps you need to tie it in with the one before or after?
I think that full-stop needs to be outside the brackets...
At this point I wonder why I bother writing poetry. Holy hot hell that's a great ending.
Well, anyway, you're still writing reams of great stuff