The smell of your death
Has not reached me yet,
But it will.
Soon Maggots and bacteria
Will return you to dust.
All you were and could ever be
dissipated into the atmosphere
Like your last gasp of air.
The surprised sigh of agony
As I plunged the silver dagger
Through your breastbone.
Sliding through your ribs.
They shall think it ritual
When they come.
Oh how I wish they would come.
Under this aged and gleaming
Oak tree I slump.
I remain, unable to flee or escape
& how shall I explain?
your fingers still laced in mine.
That I should love you so well
& yet loathe you so infinitely
If only I could express the complexity
of my heart and mind
But I will not forsake her
To a yelping, hungry media
That would feed on your corruption.
Unable to turn the lens
Onto their own bitter deeds.
NO, I can not allow the truth
to be known.
Rather would I hang
Upon my silence
Then tell them of the guilt of
your shame.
I hear them coming,
Sirens cutting like a
White hot blade
Through the still Autumn air
It is still warm
But you are not.
They are here.
May she forgive you.
For she'll never forgive me.
V.C Willow
17-07-11
Comments
V.C.Willow | July 22, 2011 - 00:28
This is a little rough around the edges but all suggestions, thoughts and comments welcome.
RachelPatricia | July 23, 2011 - 22:00
Hi V.C, I really enjoyed the fantasy element to this, and I thought it moved along really smoothly until
'That I should love you so well
& yet loathe you so infinitely'
and then I kind of didn't quite get the rest, well I did, I just didn't think it was necessary, if you know what I mean. I think that the poem says everything it needs to up to those lines, and I particularly like the vibrant imagery in the third and fifth stanzas, and the line 'when they come, they will think it ritual' - adds a whole other dimension to the piece and indicates a change in mood.
Really think you've got something good here and hope you don't mind my opinion - it's only my opinion, after all, and it's your poem, I just thought a fresh perspective might help seeing as this is a draft :)
Thanks for the read,
Rachel xx
V.C.Willow | July 28, 2011 - 15:49
sorry for the delay Rachel in replying I'm afraid I've not been able to do anything but pop on quickly recently. Thank you for your comments. The whole poem is necessary as each verse adds to the story. She has killed her lover who is entangled with her daughter and having found out she has been betrayed she takes the lover on a picnic beneath the Oak tree and stabs him with a silver dagger. She loves him so completely and yet hates him for his corruption of her daughter and his betrayal. She knows that her daughter will never forgive her, and is caught between her love and hate for her dead lover and her anxiety for her daughter. There is a definite shift in the mood of the poem as it moves through the stanzas but that mood is also the shift in the mood of our protagonist who is paralysed by her actions and the weight of the consequences of what she has done.
Thanks for the comments always good to get a different POV.
All the best
V.C