Week Five - Response to Brandy's "Our Sadness"

Our Sadness

Our sadness
does not whisper in dark corners
does not leave lonely footsteps
does not mask itself in clouds
does not have the eyes of a child


does not expel the glorious


our sadness
is a biography
a steel screeched ending
still tugging on the bone skirts


our sadness
does not stand on reason’s edge
does not fold into drawers
it hangs itself up


let the clock
hide its trite mug
behind
folded arms


our sadness
does not expel the glorious
the glorious appears near
dusk when the river’s bruise
darkens until it reaches
the mouth-hole


the dust carries
each chipped
syllable up
to hang in the rafters


not too close
not too far


By Brandy Adams

I would agree with MacKenzie, here. This is probably one of those instances where your writing is successful because of the instances of cool language that it allowed for. In general, "sadness" is a pretty baggy subject matter. But--I think "fear" is, too. Maybe that's why the anthology feels so uncomfortable to me a lot of times. Because so many of the poems feel like they do the exact opposite of what our poetry classes tell us we're "allowed" to do. Still, the original has some fairly specific images: "our fear does not have a dead man's face," where as the improv relies a bit too heavily on more baggy language: "does not expel the glorious." Maybe in a future blog you can improv this same poem but rather than using an abstract idea like the original poet does, do something absurdly "real"...like a kid's wagon or a lamp given at a house warming party.

To deviate a bit, though: LOVE the trite mug stanza. It's new and amusing and it still makes sense on a basic level. Maybe not "trite," per se, but the stanza itself--Love it.