|| Remind “”
In the middle of the night I piss beside them “” and think: I
shouldn’t be mourning you yet. “” I tell myself every day I’ll
throw them away. “” Then every morning I
get up and greet the decay like a friend ||
By Friday | I
can’t watch another living thing ||
Share suffocation in this house anymore. ||I buckle; I
wasn’t mad at the buds “” Lucky to be bought,
they no longer “” have to wait “” Tired ||
and on display, || at last no one would look at them
with scrutiny ||except for me “”
I pour out the week in the bathroom sink “” And hold
the bundle still to refill the pitcher ||I
can feel them rejoice and relax in my reach
|| With fragility and memoried paper thin skin. ||
They crunch against my will and I
“” like you, feel nothing at all. ||
No flower can survive in the dark “”
For 3 days I didn’t even look at this batch“”
Refused to cut the dead leaves || These are the prettiest ones and I || Wouldn’t give them the light or attention they need ||
|| Some women get flowers as a reminder
“” As soon as you leave, they forget why. ||
5 thoughts on "|| Remind “”"
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The most beautiful lament in these lines is the feeling of worthlessness you have for who gave the flowers.
You say “watch **another** living thing share suffocation” –and there you go breaking my heart Samantha.
But here’s where you do it for real.
“at last no one would look at them
with scrutiny ||except for me “”
I pour out the week in the bathroom sink “” And hold
the bundle still to refill the pitcher ||I
can feel them rejoice and relax in my reach
|| With fragility and memoried paper thin skin. ||
They crunch against my will and I
“” like you, feel nothing at all. ||”
By the way – memoried is a massively cool word.
In a lot of ways I felt like the flowers in this break up. Something to look at for a little while. Women often feel lucky to be bought. Women often live alone in their scrutiny in the bathroom sink reflection. And when he was “back” around, I also relaxed and rejoiced momentarily.
Not sure I understand the punctuation here, Sam, but I dig this poem.
Hah! It’s a weird one, for sure. This moment of grief felt like I couldn’t get away from these flowers. They were popping up everywhere, in my mind, in my home. I had to interrupt myself in this poem with the physicality. These represent the stems and blooms. The constant pauses represent how many times I really looked at them in a day during my grief. Thanks for reading as I play with form.
Powerful piece. I love what you said before, about the punctuation being stems and blooms. I felt very much : “By Friday | I/can’t watch another living thing ||/Share suffocation in this house anymore.”