My Feelings About Coloring or Sitting Around Wasting Time
My Feelings About Coloring or Sitting Around Wasting Time
I force myself to try,
injured and unable to drive
or go outside, I find
pencils, markers, gel pens
and mosaic coloring books
from my child’s childhood.
Then, I sit at the dining room table
and color. I feel guilty.
I feel embarrassed. I feel
disgraced by myself
and my brokenness.
Swimming in sin, I color
for hours. And I don’t stop
after the first day, I do it again.
I even enter a picture in a coloring
contest. I win a coloring book.
I am hooked until it’s time
to learn how to walk again.
13 thoughts on "My Feelings About Coloring or Sitting Around Wasting Time "
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I need help with the title and any other suggestions for improvements are welcome. I’ve decided to try to use this blog’s plethora of talented writers as an aid to improving my craft.
If you were coloring outside, people would come and look over your shoulder admiringly–just because you were not sitting around doing nothing!
sounds like me! i feel guilty then the next thing I know it’s 4 hours later and i’m into it. Thanks for sharing. The Color of Guilt
Keep on coloring, Catherine.
Everything about this poem is perfect, especially the title. It packs a wallop. It deals with an issue most of us have faced or will face. You haven’t just been sitting around coloring, you’ve been developing your poetic craft.
Although I agree with Jim. The title does work as is. It’s very honest and summarizing, in a way that allows the poem to develop without judgment.
I love this! And I love how you’ve asked for feedback. Maybe I’ll start doing that in my comments section. I always welcome it. 🙂
The stanza break at I color // for hours REALLY works. I can’t tell you how much I LOVE that you won a coloring book. I definitely chuckled. I think the first stanza could develop differently. The second 2 are perfect. Maybe a period after “go outside” to slow it down. I also notice you use the word “I” frequently in the poem – that’s not a critique, just a pattern. So, leaning into that, maybe the title needs the word I in it too. .. Great work!
WOW you all are the best. The Color of Guilt is a definite alternative to a way too long title. Thank you!
What a lovely healing act:
I force myself to try,
injured and unable to drive
or go outside, I find
pencils, markers, gel pens
and mosaic coloring books
from my child’s childhood.
I have a lot of feelings about this poem. And you know I also think you should keep brightly marking pages with joy. Jim and Emily have particularly good comments that I echo in regards to fab line breaks and jumps, art as meditation and contemplation that can spawn new art, and tackling (with charm) the box an uncooperative body can put us in. On the title, I agree with your instinct toward adjustment bc it’s too much a synopsis of the work your words do inside the piece. Let them shine like sun from a golden gel pen. I dig the guilt title suggestion, but it might be too strong–perhaps Colouring Time . (I think the u, if used, would add a lil flourish and increase ambiguity, and you could still keep the American spelling in the body if you went that direction without causing confusion, though some might think thats very uncool, haha.) Thank you for this resonating poem. 🌈🌈💚💜
L. Nicole thank you so much for your thoughts. I agree with changing the title. I believe the original was Adult Coloring. I never had the same guilt when I was able to take my broken body to the next level of art, painting with oils without staying in between the lines. Your comment was so damn poetic. “Let them shine like sun from a golden gel pen.” WOW.
I color you fabulous! I like your title but also The Color of Guilt would work. There’s nothing off-color here at all!
I am so happy I asked for opinions. Everyone’s comments have made this poem a better poem.
THANK YOU LexPoMo poets!!