Untitled Poem

I'll admit, I was so excited about seeing a dear friend of mine today that I completely forgot about posting this weeks blog post! And to everyone who expects it every week I sincerely apologize. It's just that I don't get to see this friend very often. I have a full schedule and she's working all the time so...needless to say there aren't many opportunities for us to get together. I'm sure you've all been there before. You have friends that live so close by, yet you haven't them in forever. It's frustrating isn't it? Life has a way of creating gaps when there's really no gap at all. If that makes any sense. If you've been reading my blog long enough and know my writing style and general thought process...then perhaps it should! Or perhaps you'd wish not to get inside my head at all but are content with skirting the picket fence around it. Either way is fine by me! There's an obvious irony when I write. Whether it be a weekly blog post, a paper for my college classes, a short story, a novel, a poem...or anything else...I tend to open myself up to the fullest while in real life...I'm as introverted as they get and don't particularly open up to people until I've known them a while. Maybe such a personality quirk isn't news to you, but maybe it is. I'm sure many other writers out there could vouch that their true personalities and a hidden part of themselves comes out when pen hits the paper - fingers hit the keyboard in my case! It's that side of yourself that's only accessible through writing. Like only being able to access the basement through a pair of exterior cellar doors. There's only one way you can tap the vein of that side of yourself. Perhaps you know that side well and are comfortable with the voice it portrays through words and images. Or maybe you're tentatively treading the waters, feeling your way around like walking into an unfamiliar room drenched in darkness as you search for a light switch.

No matter where you are in your writing life, I wanted to post a poem that started out as an"image" in my mind. Whenever I write I get a picture in my mind that's as clear as a photograph. It's then my compulsion as a writer to convey said image in immense detail so the reader can in turn picture that scene as clearly as I have. This particular poem came about after I'd recently heard my favorite Patsy Cline song, Walkin' After Midnight. for some reason as I was listening to the song I kept picturing the young woman singing to be lying stretched out on a cold, warped wooden floor. Perhaps it was melancholy that held her there, or grief, or confusion. Perhaps she wanted a fresh perspective on everything, on how she ended up this way. Whatever reason you come up with, or whatever you may think about my interpretation of the song...I took the idea and ran with it! The result is the untitled poem you see below. If anyone has a title suggestion I'd love to hear it! Like I've said many times before, I always look forward to comments.

Untitled Poem

Every time we argue I wind up
On the floor. Not just any floor
Will do you see, it simply has to
Be the warped floorboards of
The parlor, where we foolishly

Throngs of company
Would assemble with their
Amiable laughter and cups of tea.
There was laughter in the beginning.
It was ours wasn't it? Or am I dreaming?

I do not know why I lie on the
Cold wooden floor. These wide plank
Boards are rough and unforgiving
Much like the words you don't hear
Yourself speak, yet you love their sound.

perhaps my own words, left unspoken,
Pile against my heart until I bend
Beneath their weight, sinking to the floor
In a parallel stance to even out the pressure.
I feel the house breathe from where I lay.

One would assume when you lie
On the floor that you'd stare at the
Ceiling. sometimes I do, and can't help
But notice the spidery cracks and stains
In the old plaster we meant to repair.

I love to trace each window with my gaze,
Much like I outline your muscular frame
When you don't know I'm watching you.
Trying to carve out the man I married,
To chisel him out of the box you've locked him in.

A chill seeps into my bones as I lay here still.
As if I was sleeping upon gravestones.
I do not shiver, nor do I fetch a blanket.
The cold is numbing, as is the perspective
I gain on the world we've built and torn down.

Is it the view of a child, so small and innocent?
certainly he must look up at the world around
Him. He looks down on no one, and perhaps
Sees things the rest of us cannot.
Am I becoming a child as I lay here still?

You have never seen me like this, and
A part of me prays you never do.
For I have no explanation for you.
All times of the day, whenever angers
Arises, you will find me here, in this spot.

In the morning hours pale sunlight
Filters through window's wavy panes
To finger the brass chandeliers draped
Elegantly in cobwebs like fragile
Lace upon the bones of a skeleton.

Tall and narrow windows rise above me,
Their curtains reaching out bout never
Touching. I can see clumps of dust
Beneath the furniture, hiding like the
Ugliness we so easily hide from our neighbors.

These plaster walls cannot possibly
Refrain every argument we've had.
Whenever I walk into a room I can feel
Their combined weight fall against me,
Urging me to this spot, sending me down.

As weeks wore into years and age has taken
Its surreptitious toll, I realize that this house
Has age with me, for it too has endured the
Anger between us. If you should happen
Into the front parlor, after I'm gone

And stand to the left of the fireplace.
In front of the Victorian couch you
Bought on our anniversary you'll notice
A slight, oblong groove in the floorboards.
Someday you'll learn it was me, silently loving you.