Friday, September 5, 2008

Blind Review Friday

Time for another edition of Blind Review Friday.

The author shall remain anonymous (unless they chose to divulge themselves in the comments.)

Those commenting are also welcome to remain anonymous if they wish.

Incendiary comments will be removed

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When You Die

Do you get all the answers from questions you learned

Or do get all the questions from the answers your endured

Do you get all of your toys back from the boy down the street

Do you get all the hugs you missed at family retreats?

Is it still a disappointment after you find out there are no

spaceships hovering, just bright shadows in the sky?

When you are in line to get your first meal

Do you get a white gown that matches God's?

Do you get a white watch to keep track of time

When Gods out of the office, would he put you in his place?

Can you let your hair grow as long as you want

now that you don't have to white collar it to work?

Do your friends close the gaps with replacements of you

or move on with life with holes at their feet?

I wonder, if strawberries taste like filet minon

if you want them to-

Or if you blink a wish and a vegan meal pops up at your table.

Do all the I'm sorry's become mute and grey

turned into flower blossoms on top of your grave.

Do all the happy times stay catalogued in your rolodex?

And you can pull the old ones and play them again?

Soft worn paper and never get dementia again.

Do all of the times you paid forward

come back to you like an investment with a 4% growth?

Will all the ice cream you ate on the earth

instead of your hips go to your groin?

Will your kids forgive you for the pain in their legs

and all the illegal drugs that you smoked with your friends?

Will all the drinks you drank when you were drunk

be your morning coffee when you wake up?

Will all the skirts you wore to flirt with the boys

be made into curtains for your long windows?

Will all the books in your wooden study

be mine to read over for your memory?

Will all the hairs that went down the drain

be made into dolls for little angel babies?

Will all the eyelashes that fell on your cheek

fall into wish bowls for good girls to treat

themselves with mommy's high heels and necklaces?

Will all the kisses from your lips

be carried off into butterfly displays?

Will all my heartache from never one touch

be veiled with wings from all angels above?

Will all the dimes that fell out of your pocket

Melt into the ground for the sun to start over?

Will all the mornings blend into one sunny day

and start over a new life with one long evening?

Will all iambic pentameters be read by preschoolers

Who will learn to write sestinas by kindergarten?



4 comments:

sara holbrook said...

I like a good questioning poem, but this one, not so much. The poet has been so careless in the poem's presentation, it's hardly worth commenting on. But, here goes.

The perspective is slip sliding around from second to third to first and it has some tense issues.

"Do all the I'm sorry's become mute and grey
turned into flower blossoms on top of your grave."


Present or past tense, choose one.


"Will all the kisses from your lips
be carried off into butterfly displays?
Will all my heartache from never one touch be veiled with wings from all angels above?"


Me? Or you? Choose one.

My suggestion would be for the poet to try it in first person and narrow the questions to things he/she really cares about -- from the curtains on the long windows to sestinas written by kindergarteners is a stretch for a single poem.

I do like the line, "do your friends close the gap[s] with replacements of you" and wonder if that might be a poem in itself.

Oh, and occasional rhymes aren't workin' for me either.

ms. bree said...

and u probably should choose whether u want to punctuate a sentence or not. sometimes a question mark, sometimes not.
makes the reader care less.
any reader will respect less
the author of a slip-shoddily punctuated poem.

umm...but great sentiments!
fine ideas.

Anonymous said...

This piece barely makes sense and shows no edit time that I can see.

Anonymous said...

I was too distracted by the punctuation issues to be able to take in too much of what the poem was actually saying.

Cited...

The poet doesn't invent. He listens. ~Jean Cocteau