I’d really like
to be over you by now…
but still I suffer
loss
what we built over ten full years
was a precious living thing
still
to me not to you; I believed
what I wanted to believe, your words
when your actions were so ill so pointed
and nothing, no-one can gain your time
or your attention or care
really, but
you.
I ask myself,
beg of myself,
to move beyond
let go like everyone else believes I can but
still
I am yet so hurt and feel so rejected
that you’d put that paper doll in my place
snap! just like that
shocks me still I
still
feel winded
like I did falling off my bike at ten
unable to breathe with the impact
upon my poor sternum
of the entire planet.
And I try to hate you and
laugh at you
still
sometimes I succeed
and for a little while I feel free and strong
like the wind off the Forth on a force-ten night
whipping the black firth to a frenzy
spilling over the breakwater
threatening the million-dollar flats
overlooking the tiny lights across the river
in what they call the Kingdom of Fife
while mountains
loom dark in the distance
like grief.
And the Other has no chance, really, because
still
I awaken wondering where you are how
you
are, and the treatment I get is a million times better than
you ever meted out in demi-tasse
and scant-teaspoonsful of love
and I can’t look after you any more and
I want a chance to shine without your
envy undermining everything I try
yet not one cell of me
no mitochondrion
or bacterium
is void of
longing
still.
Advice, poetic or personal, welcome...
Comments
1 - 15 of 15
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I don't know exactly how to rate this or what to say, but I am just going to say that it appears throughout this poem there are some good words and a good blend of words that might fit better for a different poem some other day. I didn't feel that the emotions of disappointment were that vivid. Also the way some of these lines are situated are a little off balance. I hope I helped.
. Rewarded 8
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Thanks for the comments, GM, very helpful.
... when I looked again at the layout I think that might have been part of the problem - better now, i think.
Best
RA
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I come to this one late, river, but my first impulse, which I trust, is, simply, amazing. This zigzag of thoughts and feelings about a lost lover who's gone off for a "paper doll" is loaded with rich images of indecision: does the poet really want to get over it? how? why? why not? and that "void of longing" is "still" there inside. Fascinating, bright, deep, bold, passive, angry, unrelieved, yearning, stunned, grieving, trapped within - all of that is languaged in this rich poem. And more: it gives off not just a heightened sense of loss, but it gets into a reader like me with similar ambiguities of mindheart. Damn good poem! because it's got torturous and real experience pondered all over it, yet it doesn't weep (thank God); it thinks and feels, honestly. Absolutely one of your best works, in my opinion.
Later...
Lad. Rewarded 8
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RA, something very fine here...
in your dealing with loss of a close mate. The first stanza we see the difficulty in shaking off that feeling of loss. One slight confusion for me was in lines 6-9. Maybe a period at the end of "to me not to you." Or a line break, or maybe I'm not reading it correctly.
In the second stanza, the incident of falling off the bike is very powerful with the lines - "unable to breathe with the impact / upon my poor sternum / of the entire planet." I remember in my youth getting konked and feeling just like that, just me, and the rest of the world as the aggressor.
The third stanza is my favorite, it's when you catch some self-confidence and feel as free and strong as the wind. The alliteration of 'f' all the way through this stanza seems very natural and is not forced. Especially effective it's ending on "grief."
The final stanza unveils a subtle point in the relationship, that in a sense you had the upper hand and the other's envy kept you backing down. You end with the dichotomy of wanting to be free of that restraining envy and still being held by the memory and longing. Beautifully subtle realizations. I have no problems with the lack of punctuation or free structure as you know I do the same thing. Well done, MJ. Rewarded 8
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Thanks for the close read, MJJ,
... I think you were with me all the way! Also thanks for the help... I will add something to those lines 6-9, i hope a comma will do because a full stop breaks for me the sense of toppling that I wanted to express.
(LATER) No, it neded at least a semi colon!
Best
RA
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I really felt this one
RA,
Your anguish at your inability to move on despite the yearnings of both you and your friends is palpable. I loved the way you went back and forth with the feeling of such a huge loss and the wrong done to you by this individual. Emotions can get so confusing that even though the truth is staring us in the face we look right through it and continue to want what is bad for us. I suppose this is the root of all addicitions, isn't it? My favorite section:
snap! just like that
shocks me still I
still
feel winded
like I did falling off my bike at ten
unable to breathe with the impact
upon my poor sternum
of the entire planet.
It just brings me right back to childhood with the horrible, terrible, frightening pain of having the wind knocked out. A seeming near-death experience to someone unwise to the ways of the world. Being a scientist, I also particularly liked the last section re. cells and mitochondria
. You could have said golgi complex or nucleus but that wouldn't have been nearly as evocative.
Thanks for the read. I really enjoyed it!
Heidi
. Rewarded 8
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Ten years is a long time to have had a relationship with someone, only to have lost it to another woman (it sounds like). The pain of your loss certainly comes through clearly in this poem and I hope that writing it has served as a catharsis so you can finally let this person who hurt you go for good.
I like the comparison you made to how you felt when you fell off your bike and the vivid description of the Firth of Forth, which strongly mirrors the tumultuous feelings of grief you've experienced. The Firth of Forth stanza is by far the best in the poem. I felt sad that, after experiencing a rebirth of strength and self esteem, the person who abandoned you still owned your emotions and that you had given over yourself to someone who doesn't value you. It would be great if some day you could rewrite this poem and end it with the reclamation of that strength.
Because of the very personal nature and passion of this poem, and the fact that the reader can't be "in your head", I found myself getting a bit lost from time to time in the outpouring of words and had to back up and re-read groups of lines to string the thoughts together. A suggestion for consideration: employing punctuation and breaking lines at points which form cohesive thoughts would make the poem easier to read by an outsider.
I enjoyed reading this poem - as much as one can "enjoy" reading about someone's personal pain - and look forward to reading more of your work.
Dannan
. Rewarded 8
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Okay, alex.
I'm back to try and do this work justice as before I hadn't time to finish. So here goes...
There is always an inequality of love in a relationship. Rarely is the distribution of affection equivalent and all too often there is the model of Lord and vassal where one's heart is often subservient the heart of the other. And vassal not because of being less, but because of being more. Being more filled with consideration, more love, more admiration, more attraction. All of it currency that the Lord tosses into the treasury and hoards, rather than redistributing the wealth. And so the emotional vassal is left a pauper to the wealth of the giving that has been delivered the lord yet with no return on the investment. The lord is greedy, or...the lord does not feel the same and hence is incapable of satisfying the requisite return.
Longing and love, true love, can be lopsided, and when it is it destroys. The intensity of love given equals the intensity of loss when love is not given in return. And yet still, you have longing. It's sick in the head and makes the case for revolution, to break free and begin anew. And you start... and in that moment the reader cheers for the imminent deliverance of the subject from this terrible pain. But you fall right back into it and there is left the terrible hole left by lost love. Still... When I finished reading this, the saying occurred to me "we are our own jailers" And truly you have painted well the description of your cell in this poem. It's very sad and made me want to give you a great big, very sincere hug, alex. This was excellent and very moving and very powerful. This was full of you, and I think that's why I enjoyed it so much.
Nice work, alex.
al -
< Thanks, C,
I looked up your piece and thought it was hot. Best RA -
Well done again RA
Excellent stuff.
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Damn...
this is incredible. Every freakin' fibre of your being is crying out in this write and it blows me away. Really quite stupendous. Being as how I have some stairs to run right not I've no wish to be rushed or trite so I promise you a thorough review later. This hurts so much, alex. It makes the reader wanna give you a big hug but not, because 'twould be such a paltry gesture in the face of such pain. This was incredible, alex. I absolutely loved it. I will be back.
al
. Rewarded 8
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Defeatist
WBL:
Use of title as repeated theme: Still. not the still of peace; but the still of continuing pain. There is a plaintiveness in the use of the word; an edge of regret; of unfinished business.
I liked the choppiness of the form. It was like listening to one side of a telephone conversation.
Stanza 1: sense of loss over the destruction of what was built with much labour.
Stanza 2: What did you do after you fell off your bike at 10? [besides hurt] Did you get assistance? Or comforting? Or just got back on your bike and finished the ride? Yes, the protagonist hurts terribly for being rejected. But, seriously, what value does the rejector's opinion hold? The very act of betrayal has canelled their opinion' validity.
Stanza 3: The Firth of Forth stanza is by far the best in the poem. It is almost an entire poem in itself.
Your description of the Firth reminded me of the railbridge collapse on the firth many many decades ago - complete devistation in the dark of a storm.
Stanza 4: Vocabulary in the last stanza is excellent, and the form focuses the reader on the feelings of the protagonist.
Second stanza - snap, just like that. Very dramatic. Gives the sense of shock a being betrayed without warning.
Paper doll: cut out, no substance, plaything. Excellent image.
We always have a choice; hate or love. If we focus on hate, then we become like the thing/person we hate. If love, then love transforms us. 'Time' brings only the anesthesia of faulty memory; never 'healing' of wounds. Only the willing choice to love the thing/person we once hated can bring that healing.
Why is the protagonist in the poem still seeking their validation as a person from someone who's behaviour disqualifies them altogether?
. Rewarded 8
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Loved this RA
Loved how you formed it, bringing it back to single worded lines giving the piece even more power
It flowed so well and emotion came through strong
The only thing ti needs to be really is a little work on the puctuation/grammat..thats all
Cindy
. Rewarded 6
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Not-so-still-waters...
Alex, this feels cathartic and I'm sure it does the job it set out to do well. I could pick at it here and there but I have no desire to. Your hurt, your disappointment and frustration are richly worded here.
Your work in describing the Firth of Forth was the highlight for me, and not for sentimental reasons (I've never seen it. And yet, when I think of Scotland I always see black hills, sparsely dotted with little lights - but I digress).
like the wind off the Forth on a force-ten night
whipping the black firth to a frenzy
spilling over the breakwater
threatening the million-dollar flats
overlooking the tiny lights across the river
in what they call the Kingdom of Fife
while mountains
loom dark in the distance
like grief.
This was great. In so many ways it seems like a metaphor for the feeling the whole poem is trying to nail. You are the dark mountains and the Firth, the Kingdom of Fife itself. She, the enemy, is the presumptuous, flashy little property developement, interloping on your banks.
Still waters run deep, lassie.
>W<
. Rewarded 8
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