The RetroLounge Daily Poem Thread (Fri 3/6/2009)

[RetroLounge]

How Many Times

No matter how many times I try I can’t stop my father
from walking to my sister’s room

and I can’t see any better, leaning from here to look
in his eyes. It’s dark in the hall

and everyone’s sleeping. This is the past
where everything is perfect already and nothing changes,

where the water glass falls to the bathroom floor
and bounces once before breaking.

Nothing. Not the small sound my sister makes, turning
over, not the thump of the dog’s tail

when he opens one eye to see him stumbling back to bed
still drunk, a little bewildered.

This is exactly as I knew it would be.
And if I whisper her name, hissing a warning,

I’ve been doing that for years now, and still the dog
startles and growls until he sees

it’s our father, and still the door opens, and she
makes that small oh turning over.

Marie Howe

*******************

:hi:

RL

[blueraven95]

1. ...

:hi:

[RetroLounge]

2. Good Morning!

:hi:

RL

[Chorophyll]

3. ...

Yipes. (Unironically.)

[RetroLounge]

8. yeah...

:cry:

RL

[Justpat]

4. .

:cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:

[RetroLounge]

9. pretty intense...

:cry:

:hi:

RL

[Tuesday Afternoon]

5. Blue Iris already posted this one

visceral imagery. Punched me in the gut. very effective, this one.

[RetroLounge]

10. ...

:hi:

RL

[Lyric]

6. I love this one. We read the whole book in my 213 class.

This poem had me in tears.

:hug:

[RetroLounge]

11. Amazingly powerful and horrific

in such an unsettling quiet way...

:hug:

RL

[CaliforniaPeggy]

7. My dear Retro...

Exquisite, and so sad...

:cry:

[RetroLounge]

12. ...

:hug:

RL