| Red Roses, No Encore
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Isabelle5
| I learned to read your body when you spoke - | 1 |
more eloquent than words - | 2 |
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when Vodka tangled up your tongue, | 3 |
when whiskey made you mean, | 4 |
your body language warned me | 5 |
with the truth. | 6 |
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A drunken kiss attempted might not | 7 |
have landed upon a proffered cheek | 8 |
but there was always success for your fist, | 9 |
which never failed to make contact | 10 |
when your booze-fueled anger burned. | 11 |
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I read a book which clearly said | 12 |
“One cannot have a relationship | 13 |
with a bottle,” but yes, oh yes, I did. | 14 |
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You were the bottle come to life, | 15 |
a stuporous dancer on a brilliant, | 16 |
back-lit stage, pretending | 17 |
to be a husband, | 18 |
pretending to be whole, | 19 |
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while I was the dumbfounded | 20 |
audience of one, applauding | 21 |
with blistered hands, | 22 |
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fooling no one but the dead-eyed woman | 23 |
who smiled at me with bleeding lips | 24 |
from her cracked and sorrowed mirror. | 25 |
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10 Feb 09 |
Rated 8.5 (8.5) by 2 users.
Active (2): 8, 9
Inactive (0):
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Comments:
Very true and very effectively written. The metaphor is equally as impressive throughout.
— unknown
Let's have a closer look at L2. In my opinion, "much more eloquent than any words" has a clunk to it; it seems weighed down by too many words." My suggestion would be: "more eloquently (Make the adjective an adverb.) than words. Food 4 thought.
— unknown
Yes, I see that. I made a small change, not happy with eloquently but I like your having pointed out that line.
— Isabelle5
Good! Better!
— unknown
i love abuse, personally.
— unknown
Well, thank you for that helpful insight into your life but how does that help me write this poem better?
— Isabelle5
well 7-8 are clunky..."attempted" and "might not" strung together? well, the former informs the latter does it not...? and then "proffered" is just too much language really, too 19th century i think.
"with the truth" is jarring. but i can't really distinguish it from the previous line, which is to say, they don't jive. and to me, the end note falls short of the promise the second strophe inititally set-up. "vodka" and "whiskey" being tangible. the "tangled" tongue being very much real for me.
"stuporous"-- yes, fitting. but maybe a tad over-analytical.
"applauding...." and from there it is nicely ended.
yay! a poem with promise.
— DeformedLion
THROW UP
— unknown
Strong opening. Brilliant title. Stanzas 2, 4, and 5 are most effective to my reading. I especially like L15, dynamic metaphor and deceptively true. I might drop "brilliant" out of it.
— NicMichaels
BTW it ain't easy to use roses in a fresh way unless you have a vase, but you did that, in the title. Bravo.
— NicMichaels
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