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Open Poetry #46
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bel1e
Senior Member
since 2006-07-24
Posts 1631


0 posted 2010-09-28 08:24 AM


All morning long this scarlet thrush
hurls itself at my window,

relentless,
and single minded, I almost
let it in myself, though
once I’d seen a red moth, crazed
by the walls of my room,

spatter its pollen wings
all over the house,

coming all apart,
the last of its stitches
ripped out with your death,
and I was left, ridiculous
to write condolences to myself,
in a room of curved walls, round
with my own hair, coarse and brown
as homespun rope,
it smelled of nothing but me,

I can still remember
marking out the time
on the length of my braid,
little scraps of ribbon: red
for the damp days, and red
is how the deathwatch beetle
earned its name, not because it was so ugly,
not from my terror,

simply, by the sound it made, ticking,

I can still remember
shivering on a little silver footstool,
milkteeth chattering, listening to my hair grow,
like the sound of crickets, whispering,
and how it strangled sparrows dead in the eaves,
beneath the cobbled walls, spread
upon the linden and bramble,

On Sundays,
I’d dream of basking in the noon’s splintered gold,

dear Prince, Sweet Prince,
there is no escape, they’ll scale the shadows
and find us here by sunset,

no laughter can change this chance,
no breath under blue
of the brilliant twilight will save us,

listen, now listen
to the leaves and watch the lichen
glisten, my sweet prince and true,
what has become of you ?


let down your hair, my love,
all gnarls and jangles,
for my wings are tangled
in the vines, and I can hardly fly these days,

so I burrow and stamp,
and the radishes go up in my path,
curling from the dark like beckoning,

pretty bird, pretty bird, you said,
don’t be afraid of the dark,
or the dread ticking tock,


O how it batters against my skull, so wild
to get through that bloodied window.

             

© Copyright 2010 babygirLPress - All Rights Reserved
Cpat Hair
Deputy Moderator 1 Tour
Member Patricius
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793

1 posted 2010-09-28 08:39 AM


Love what you do with fairy tales Belle..

have always enjoyed the twists you add to the telling.... and the beauty you paint with with words.

Margherita
Member Seraphic
since 2003-02-08
Posts 22236
Eternity
2 posted 2010-09-28 09:11 AM


Your unique style never fails to captivate me.

Powerful imagery that lingers in the mind.

Love,
Margherita

Eusta B. Mae
Senior Member
since 2010-05-03
Posts 903

3 posted 2010-09-28 09:33 AM


Wow! ebm
bel1e
Senior Member
since 2006-07-24
Posts 1631

4 posted 2010-09-28 09:47 AM


Thanks Chief~~~

xoxoxoxoxoxox

             

bel1e
Senior Member
since 2006-07-24
Posts 1631

5 posted 2010-09-28 09:48 AM


Margherita~ a sincere pleasure to captivate you <3

             

bel1e
Senior Member
since 2006-07-24
Posts 1631

6 posted 2010-09-28 09:48 AM


EBM~

Thanks for the WOW !

             

Sunshine
Administrator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-06-25
Posts 63354
Listening to every heart
7 posted 2010-09-28 11:13 AM


Smiling at you, Belle...

only recently at our weekly poetry meetings have two specific words been introduced in poetry...that being Rapunzel and the other...unnaturally..."death watch beetle." Makes me wonder what's in the water.

Good to read you, as always, a sheer delight.




bel1e
Senior Member
since 2006-07-24
Posts 1631

8 posted 2010-09-28 12:38 PM


Hey Sunshine~

I assure you, pure coincidence...this poem (if indeed poetry it is? ha! ) was written a couple of years ago...and I am just dragging some old moth-eaten stuff into the light here~



Thanks for taking a peek~*~

             

easy1
Senior Member
since 2010-05-22
Posts 1209
Southeastern USA
9 posted 2010-09-29 02:41 AM


"All glory is fleeting," or so I have read and heard.

I like this poem. It reads well. Sometimes it's hard not to remember and remonstrate, even when no signficant blame should attach.

The leaf sounds and lichen glisten bring back now-distant, somewhat fragmentary memories, too.

bel1e
Senior Member
since 2006-07-24
Posts 1631

10 posted 2010-09-29 01:49 PM


thanks easy1

             

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