closet doors.

when i was a little girl

monsters lived inside the walls

and the closet was a place i knew 

held myriads of unknown dangers in the night

after all, didn't i have my very own closet?

it's where i put all the things 

i didn't want to know

and all the darkest aspects of people

they didn't know i knew

why shouldn't my bedroom closet

hold as many twisty turns

as the one i carried with me

every single day?

i was the smiley wrengirl

blonde and sunny

tough and tiny

irrepressible, stubborn

no one knew all my secrets

least of all me

because unlike my bedroom closet

with its flimsy bi-fold slats

my older brother had already kicked in twice...

i knew how to build a door

Reviews

[Devons]

This is quite an original, psychological poem that makes a very incisive point about a concept which is well known the world over in its various forms: the childhood fear of the closet, the wardrobe, the attic.. the fear of the unknown, the imagination, the darkness, the unseen, and the fear of even fear itself. And every day we deal with or face these fears in our minds. And -as the poem inquires- perhaps this fear of the closet is representative of the fears that we harbour within ourselves...
"why shouldn't my bedroom closet
hold as many twisty turns
as the one i carried with me
every single day?"
Like "Toys in the attic"... Which reminds me of Pink Floyd's epic metaphor "The Wall", except this concept is perhaps a little darker here in these verses (although made more human and palatable by some fraternal references eg. "the smiley wrengirl").. Darker in the sense that the "door" (equivalent of "the wall") is a mental mechanism which hides fears rather than realities about oneself. They are linked of course, but the concept is individual. The fact that the "older brother had already kicked in (the door) twice.." reflects a kind of analogous action which reverberates and echoes symbolically the power of those fears in the effect the closet has had on him...
"I knew how to build a door"... is a conclusively insidious way to show how we can control our fears by maintaining a 'mental door', but ultimately there are extraneous 'doors' we cannot control... And sometimes, perhaps, for those less fortunate, the other way around.
To coin a cliche, a thought-provoking piece of work. Told in a clear, concise, and intelligent manner which effectively manages to echo its meaning within the reader's mind. A very smart angle of approach.

[Ed Hart]

of course, the world came at all of us with whips and scorns, and we learned to hide; but for little girls, i think, the assaults are more soul deadly...and all the men and boys i have know were part of it

[Zeitgeist Manifesto]

This was pretty heavy. I didnt expect the ending to hit so hard.
I thought about those doors and how much force it would take
to get through it all.

[Crowley]

This is unbelievably honest...and suitably tragic. This was as about as well written and intended as any poem I have read on this site. Makes me want to hug you and then scratch my own eyes out when I realize that sometimes this is life...it is what we have, what we deal with. Face it, punch it, fear it, just don't pass it on. Really good, very sad.

[.]

"the closet was a place i knew
held myriads of unknown dangers in the night"

{such a creative line...really awesome...clever imagism !!!}

"my older brother had already kicked in twice
i knew how to build a door"

{I Just Love This Poem...Magnificent- it has a mood of inner strength !!! }

james:-)