In my communications class (The Documentary Form), as we were watching a propaganda film, I started writing. It mainly comes from this one line I've been mulling over: "I often wonder about her drunk father." Heavy, I know. But I like it a lot, so here's a bit of a free write, a starting point. Err...let me know stuff? Hah, I'm not one to share a lot of poetry, even if it's fiction like this, but here you go.
* * *
* * *
That afternoon under snow cloud mirrors
the sparrow and the nightingale fly,
feeling the light wet of snowflakes dribble between feathers,
and from the pavement below, she watched them flit
in and out of the marble clouds.
I often wonder about her drunk father
on nights where I can't sleep,
standing at the kitchen sink in half darkness,
watching him shovel snow mounds from their driveway,
seeing the steaming condensation from his breath glow amber.
His ill fitted hat.
Glass stained eyes.
It's easy to forget you were once a boy, a child.
The next afternoon she stands outside on a cleared patch of driveway,
eyes skyward.
How she wished she was a nightingale.
Lovely as always, Lauren. And (again, as always) brilliant, sharp imagery. I wonder a little about the beginning mention of both the sparrow and the nightingale, and the disappearance of the sparrow in the rest of the poem. I think you could just keep the one bird. There are a couple of tense issues, in both the first stanza and the last (how do you get from "stands" to "wished"?) and the address to the father at the end of the second stanza is slightly jarring.
ReplyDeleteBut, man, "seeing the condensation from his breath glow amber"? Gorgeous. As always.