EXCERPT of:The Carnival:
Always started with such promise:
boys hoping for a taste of cherry lip gloss
girls waiting to be wanted, to be touched,
luminescent.
Crowds concealing a million heartbreaks,
electric lights igniting impossible rhythms.
--CDM, 2009--
This draft:
Inspired by Read Write Poem's Prompt #98
Photo by AuburnNewYork
10 comments:
Della, I am overcome by emotion. And as I look over this poem a second, a third, a fourth time, I know that I am not being toyed with. There is no melodrama here. The horror is understated.
The poem is exquisitely crafted, beginning all young innocence and playing at losing it, them moves through awkward interaction with the boys, still feeling pretty innocent, down through the prospect of abuse from an inebriated, to the knowledge of incestual sexual abuse or rape. It is constructed to gradually reveal to the reader what the neighbor on the street is blind to.
Absolutely devastating.
And beautifully written.
Jamie snuck down the hill
with a high school boy,
her peach bra strap showing,
hair a riot of crimson curls, eyes lined bruise-blue.
So deftly handling the details. Innocence and experience.
This a patient, tragic poem that fully deserves its length and its klieg-lit, unflinching examination of hurtful and extremely intimate situations. Paul is right about the sequencing of the poem; the way it builds on each revelation of innocence lost, although by the end we know that the narrator was tragically aware, because of her relationship with her father, of the hard facts much, much sooner than her adolescent visit to the fair. This deft final revelation, which revises the others is superbly handled.
well done..niceley written and a very good read
This poem deals with the theft of innocence in a subtle and sensitive
manner.It also raises very important issues of the widespread mistreatment of women in our society.As Paul suggested it is so commonplace that the neighbours are blind to it.This is a poem that
young women should read to learn
what is unacceptable and to speak out against it.
It is a beautifully crafted poem
with particular regard to the denouement.Thankyou for writing this and I look forward to reading
more of your work
The reality of life that some young girls live with is very tragic. There are more scary "rides" than what the carnival presents. My heart cries for the young girl in your poem. You crafted the poem in such a compelling, beautiful read. Thank you, Della.
The tension builds well - it's weird, but I wrote a poem with a similar ending (the worker's inappropriate lingering, the helplessness) for a mini-challenge earlier this fall...
This piece spoke volumes...so dad and beautifully done. There were parts that could have been snipped out to be poems on their own merit,
Thanks for letting me into your thoughts!
I agree with all praise above. For me, the great poignancy of this coming-of-age poem is that there is no mother, no female figure to confront the father -- only "other parents" who also don't intervene (and possibly a church leader and community who fail to intervene also). I don't assume that this poem is about your own life (autobiographical), but even if it's fiction, it's compelling and believable.
Beautifully constructed story, from the lights and colors and flavors of the group, pairing off and clustering, to the solitary beginning.
Some nice language, too: indulging in flirtation &
cotton candy until their bellies cramped with sugar
Thank you all so much for the feedback! I'm looking forward to reading some of your work now too. This poem is truly in its earliest stages still so I'll reflect on these comments as well as my writing group's when I go to revise it!
Best Wishes,
D.
Post a Comment