I
I never complained
I know you tried to give me a
Clean, healthy childhood
Soap in cuts
Has desensitized my pain tolerance
II
I never cried
Because he said tears
Were for babies
And I’m growing up
Too fast.
III
I never fell
Out of a tree house.
In the fifth grade
Your son beat me with a
Baseball bat.
IV
I never knew why
The neighbors
Didn’t hear my screams
Maybe that’s why
I’m so quiet now.
V
Stop trying to imagine.
Author notes
Didn't know I had to have comments here.
Anyway. Um, there's not that much to say about this other than what I've said. I purposefully constructed the third stanza to be blatant and open. Seeing as I'm writing this to my parents from my point of view about my brother, it's implied that I've been hiding things for a while, so here I'll just say it like it really is. I'm not trying to make you guess.
A contest entry
- dark writes (just...make me feel something) by my--i u--k i.
542 points, ended January 28, 2008, 24 entries
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
Comments
-
this is a good poem
the "cleanliness/soap in cuts" is a good concept, but I don't know if you said it that well here. you could try and rephrase.
3 and 4 are not as much of a punch as you think they are. 5 could be powerful, but instead means nothing. It means something, but not much.
again, i find myself telling someone writing a poem that turnes out to be about physical abuse to stop being specific about it. the fact that it's physical abuse, and your mentions of specific incidents, well....they detract.
If you were to replace 3 and 4 with more 'mixed phrases', which is what I'm calling the thing i complemented you on before, then you'd have an excellent poem.
this is a good poem. but i'm looking for perfection. so don't take it personally
in addition, you are in violation of the contest rules, because you have _nothing_ in your author's notes. while I won't boot you from the contest, I also won't give you any prizes w/o that being fixed. -
wow.
hm.....
i'm not exactly sure what, i feel.
but it's something.
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