Grex Poetry Conference

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Grex Poetry Item 46: harpers back
Entered by harper on Thu Mar 4 18:07:53 UTC 1999:

To hurt a man
Take not a thing he loves
Simply return it broken
Beyond repair
He is left with but two options
He may willingly cast it away
Knowing that he may never touch it again
Or he may clutch this broken thing
Tightly to his breast
That the shards may pierce his heart
And now I need to know, all I need to know
Are we broken?
Am I simply rejecting the plain truth
The simple fact
Of shattered bone and glass impaling my heart
It should be so glaringly obvious
So blatant
But here I am
Left to myself
With now way of knowing the difference
Between mortal wounds and simple human failings
So much do I simply desire
That everything could be made right
But my mind is so overfilled
With twisted and writhing contradictions
You say that I am all that you want
But plead for something else
You say that we are as we should be
But you seek to set us apart
Do you quantify your love
Is it simply some material possesion
Added to your bag of tricks
I know not the questions
To answer or ask
What riddle must be solved
That we might return
To some sembalance of stability
Or security
Or happiness
I can't hold this fear at bay
That we are indeed broken
That I am simply trudging forward
In some self deluded denial
Blithly ignoring the slowly dwindling flow
Of my soul as it pours out
Around this smashed clock work automation
Are we broken?
Or is this too
Some sort of paranoia inflicted delusion
Are we broken?
Or simply growing beyond our means
What I hold for you is limitless
But I fear it's sweetness
Is growing past its prime
Will a taint of bitterness set the wedge
That begins the crack
That pulls too rough
On fragile spindle, flywheels, gears, and springs
If we are not yet broken
Then we must cut away this bitterness
This cancer
Before we aquire a taste
You claim to hold me back
And I can only disagree so many times
Before denial becomes meaningless or trite
I am afraid
And my fear is all that keeps me standing
Keeps me from looking too closely
At the face of what we have
I fear because I am terrified of bitter endings
And all that I can remember of bitter endings
Is that they have such beautiful beginnings
You say that I am not to rely on your happiness
And all I can say is that I do not
I rely on you to be what and who you are
And sometimes it hurts
Pain is a part of life
Of happiness
Of pleasure
Of extasy
I can say nothing more
There is no action I may perform
I am trapped upon this path
And I will survive it
And if it is within my power
You will survive it with me
We've only one option left my dear
Come
Let us jump into this extasy

3 responses total.

#1 of 3 by orinoco on Thu Mar 4 22:44:28 1999:

I think stanza breaks would improve this a lot for me.  There are a couple
of places where it seems to switch gears, and it would be nice if you could
emphasize those places.  For example, after "that the shards may pierce his
heart" up at the beginning, the voice switches from a sort of abstract proverb
to you talking about your situation - do _something_ to underline that switch!

#2 of 3 by bookworm on Mon Mar 8 06:31:32 1999:

You could probably break this up into three or more poems, harper.  I 
liked the part up until "bone and glass impaling my heart."  After that, 
I get confused with the change in metaphor.

#3 of 3 by lumen on Mon Mar 8 23:00:08 1999:

You have to remember my brains shortcircuited a little this quarter and 
it's hard for me to digest something that big.

I believe in the writing process as art; the evolution of a poem can be 
appreciated.  Although this work *could* stand on its own, I do agree 
that you might use stanza breaks or separate material to other poems so 
that it could be more easily read, understood, and appreciated by your 
audience.

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