mirror number 6

title wip

i’ve been stuck in backwards reflection

right where you left me

covering my scabs for apathy 

i still want to be seen

in long sleeves, in a corner seizing

i get so sick of these things

how people see, the sculpted things

to have meaning, i fold as they please

backwards reflections, powder veils between

a reminder, am i kind or asleep,

who am i to complain or dream?

i get tired, i fold and i seize

i can’t handle affection

any connection is a woed distraction 

am i kind or am i weak?

i pick at my arms, i don’t speak

my sleeves are bloodstained

i’ve forgotten and i’m pretending

i wanted my carcass

i forgot to let it bleed

in a backwards reflection 

picking my arms for attention

all i wanted, the only thing left

was to be left alone 

Reviews

[JayG]

This is you talking TO someone not introduced, about the result of unspecified events. You have context. The person your complaining to has context. The reader? Not a clue.

Perhaps, had you sent it to this unidentified person, it would be meaningful to them. To the reader? Why should they care? Given that you, the other person, and the events are all unknown to that reader, for all they know it's all your fault.

Who one came here today hoping to learn how you feel? No one. They came to be entertained. And what's entertaining about a stranger complaining to someone unknown?

My point is that as poets we don't tell the reader that WE cried. We give THE Reader a reason to weep. We don't talk about feelings. We make the reader feel them, which takes more than the fact-based writing skills we learn in school.

Poets have been screwing up while writing in every waypossible, for centuries. And as they did, they identified the traps and found ways around them. Learn that and you, too, avoid the traps. Skip that step and you fall in, over and over, never knowing you have. There's no way around that, because it's not about talent or writing skill, it's having the tools the job requires.

So...grab a good book on the basics of writing poetry, like Mary Oliver's, A Poetry Handbook, and dig in.

You'll be glad you did.