Description: you = me
we = the friends i am so blessed to have right now
vengence = all the males in my world who have suddenly aquired shotguns and are ready to rampage rome in search of one person
overall... this is written in attempt to show my friends that i really do appreciate everything they are doing to help me right now... realising how redundant they feel their "im so sorry"s are and knowing they wish they could take it all away and knowing it kills them they cant...
please dont bash this one too hard
this is my first attempt at expressing anything since it happened...
vengence is broken mirrors -------------------------------------------
the universe
is mirrored
in your eyes tonight
walking around
like a beautified corpse
(we can tell you're not quite you)
vengence erases nothing
but it does appease
our sense of uselessness
in this situation
(please forgive our selfishness)
the acute poverty of our response
breaks our hearts and yet
there are no words
to make this better...
(if there were
we would make them into wings
and teach you to fly once more)
I certainly did enjoy this...of course, I came into it with the notion that you gave me in my piece, but that just allowed me to relate to it that much more. IT was an amazingly heartfelt piece.
I loved the eloquence of it, and "the acute poverty of our response
breaks our hearts and yet
there are no words
to make this better...
(if there were
we would make them into wings
and teach you to fly once more)"
Such a contrast to 'Bodies for breaking'. That is a poem about strength, this is about weakness.
I empathise with your friends. My first work posted on this site was something I wrote after my lover at the time told me she had been raped several years previously. I had had no idea. The anger, the powerlessness, the completely-not-knowing what to say, you express them perfectly here. It's an admirable skill to be able to write so accurately from someone else's point of view.
Having said that, I don't quite know why you used "beautified corpse" in the second, in my mind that turns the image of you into something quite grotesque, which I'm sure wasn't what your friends were thinking. ('Beautiful' probably wouldn't have had that effect.)
Parantheses usually annoy me in poems, but i think ending on them was a good move here: it's like the poem just fades out, further signifying the sense of hopelessness running through it.
Good write. I promise to read some of your recent stuff later.
Time to leave you another comment, lol. There's tons I wanna say about this poem but I don't really know how to word it all...but I shall try. This poem just floors me. It's beautiful. You do an awesome job of capturing how other people feel.
I really love the title..."vengence is broken mirrors"...so true. In someone's comment above they said it should be a proverb and I agree.
"the universe is mirrored in your eyes tonight
walking around like a beautified corpse (we can tell you're not quite you)"
...that part gives me chills, seriously. wow.
the acute poverty of our response breaks our hearts and yet there are no words to make this better...
I love that stanza...it really shows the helplessness of the people around you. We wish we could do something to help, but there seems to be nothing. And "I'm sorry" just sounds so stupid to say.
I think this is gonna be a favorite. I love it. It's completely amazing. Thanks for posting this one. If anything it shows how well you are doing with what happened. I hope that posting it helped somehow... I can't think of anything useful to say...seems like everything I wanna say I've said probably a billion times before. I guess I'm done here then... I love you. ~Carrie
Midnight brings me the skin for this one now... I am floored by this piece. Every line, a shadowed window. You wrote in the intro:
please dont bash this one too hard this is my first attempt at expressing anything since it happened...
You couldn't have expressed it better, no one could. God knows I can't. That hideous silence of the ever-circling "friends," and their unease that permeates the situations to the point of being unbearable for both you and them... They are afraid to speak, because that dam of tears is just below the fixed smile and no one wants to be the one to make it break... Well-meaning, loving torture. They have no words. Their touch seems superficial in the wake of such grief. So everyone pretends it's all "ok," and the only right answer to their sincere "Are you ok?" is "Yes, I think so." More fractures, more alienation. Pretending more for them, than for you. Because they don't realize the world has stopped. They just know when they look into your eyes, the world has stopped for you. Life is pointless. You breathe only because you're breathing... for what reason, you can't find a single clue.
For being the first thing you were able to write, it far exceeds all other things you could have possibly said, or that anyone could say, about such a devastating loss. Eloquent, superb expression. Thank you for writing this, because it must have been like an exorcism, to give so much of your soul.
Something definately happened to you. (we can tell your not quite you).
Its telling me that something bad must have happened. and not like a break up, but something far worse. but it could be anything.
And true friends always feel like they aren't helping enough because your not feeling better and feel as if you feel shunned which causees them to feel selfish.
All friends wish to see their friends regain their strength and get over what has happened.
True friends can see into your inner soul and see the real you and always know if something is okay or if its not.
They can see the universe in your eyes and see what you see, but not the exact pain.
Your beautiful to them, but they hate seeing you walk around like the living dead.
By the way, anything your going through I hope it turns out okay. and if its anything along the lines of what I think it may be then it too has happened to me... Twice now... once just last week... too drunk to do a thing about it. If you need someone to ever talk to Im avaible....
I do feel the pain. I have lived with the feeling of wanting to make something right you could never erase. The only solice was to be there and sometimes that just seems like it's not enough. Saddly some things you just can't change. I hope your feeling of safety in this world returns one day. Noone should have that sickend feeling in the pit of their stomach. From a friends stand point, I would say you were dead on here. Thanks for sharing.....
This is beauty. This is pain. This is helplessness felt by those who love and care about you. There are so many of those people out there. Wanting so badly to mend this brokenness that it makes tears fall from their eyes. The ending is tragic. The ending is just right. The ending is beautiful. I’m sorry for what happened to make this piece come alive. You are really amazing. And strong. So strong. Just keep breathing sweetie. Take things as they come and hold onto the people helping you. *Hugs* This is a favorite. You know where I am if you ever need anything. Hugs and love sweetie. <3
This was so beautiful, wow impressive too, I'm not sure if I could have pulled it off, but I loved it, it's a sorta double edged sword too tho, you had to have been hurt ((unless you're WAY lucky, probably on more the one occasion)) and you write about pain so perfectly, I'm sorry that someone/a group of ppl/events made you go through this pain, but you seem like a strong person who'll get thro it all, I know this probably sounds stupid cuz i don't know really anything about u but I'm here if you ever wanna talk about anything;) good write, I'll look forward to reading more from you soon, take care, ~jesa
i shan't be hard on this, because i like it. very solid.
the universe is mirrored in your eyes tonight
walking around like a beautified corpse
-GREAT IMAGERY, beautified corpse! woohoo!
(we can tell you're not quite you)
vengence erases nothing but it does appease our sense of uselessness in this situation (please forgive our selfishness)
the acute poverty of our response breaks our hearts and yet there are no words to make this better... (if there were we would make them into wings and teach you to fly once more)
the universe is mirrored in your eyes tonight
(such a broken place...)
ahh, i like that broken place is the universe, but truly it is only your eyes. i like this write. great vocabulary. maybe too great, but that's my only possible critique.
so kind of you, to write a poem of sympathy for your friends who are solely worried about you.
reading & re-reading, i can see, mirrored in this the eyes of the person who wrote it...
what strikes me most about it is how genuinely you have portrayed people's reactions- how i can tell, without knowing and without the description, that this is something to be taken seriously- there is a heavy weight to your words.
I'm not going to go real in-depth on this one, but i will say one thing: i love the title, it should be a proverb- exactly so- and it fits perfectly.
You have such a great understanding- that vengence will do nothing but ease the sense of uselessness- and asking for forgiveness for being..."selfish" ...is heartbreaking.
the ending... the perfect repetition, the back-to-the beginning, none-of-this-really-makes-a-difference aesthetic with that last line is... almost flooring. it makes me feel as if i've shrunk, or sunk down, and forgotten what it was like to be tall. i don't know... i'm rambling...
Well, This leaves me a little sad as to relize that you have had some kind of life altering event in your life that has given way to this poem.
The write itself is very touching in that you don't seek vengence and how you tell those who would avenge you that it is not right even though it would be sweet. I like the third party lines in this.
Your friends are there to help you even when they would like to fix the issue themselves. Sometimes it is just easier to deal with it on your own and just let your friends be there to hold you and comfort you.
Vengence is mine sayith the Lord.
Well I have rambled enough and I loved the write. I hope you find that friends will always be there when they are needed and that you allow them to be there when they are needed.
This start's off sounding happy. The first line is so misleading to the conclussion. "We can tell you're not quite you." I really like that line. Some times I can hear it as an underlying note when I'm spoken to (at least a few months ago, when I was going through a depression). The next stanza, the "vengeance" stanza, is very true. We can bring ourselves statisfaction, but it will neither change nor erase the past. The next stanza is saying (or so I gather), that their apologies are so, unworthy to the damage done, and they wish that there was more they could do. And then we return to the beginning, with an epiphanal twist. I enjoyed this poem a lot, it was a great write. I love that line, "We can tell you're not quite you."
Indeed, humans are hardwired for vengeance. Its been clinically shown that all the therapy in the world can't match good old fashioned retribution for the cause of mental health. A beautiful corpse indeed, becuase this powerless feeling of not being able to protect those ur care about, it makes you dead inside. More bones in the catacombs and more skeletons in the closet. Damn man, I kno wot ur males are going thru. shard
and that you could hearken to those very words you said. "vengence erases nothing but it does appease our sense of uselessness in this situation (please forgive our selfishness) " and that was so true...
So, honestly, you made me break down. Into heart-wrenching sobs. I can't evne see the blasted screen barely. Believe me. I'm not male, but I could acquire a shotgun and go to Rome with them. What's the saying about Hell has no fury like a woman's scorn? Well.....that...
Man, that is awesome. I never thought of writing to myself. it makes sense though; when terrible things happen you are talking constantly to yourself trying to make sense of the mess you're in. And I always have an internal struggle to refrain from being vengeful. It takes a lot of strength sometimes. Especially when its a very personal pain they've caused... The repitition of the first stanza makes me think of a mirror, as well... nice touch. and the last line just sinks my heart. I'm sorry you hurt. jess
I'm sorry about what happened. It's a crazy world, to make the understatement of a lifetime. I like the self-reflective mode of this. Mirrors and reflections are some of my favorite symbols. I like the parenteticals a lot. I think you did a good job here, but I'd probably reconsider the ellipses. I think they work there because you can read it trailing off, but I think that it's stronger without them.
the universe is mirrored in your eyes tonight
(such a broken place...)
That is apt, and the striations on irises do look like broken mirrors. I also think that you're seeing the universe reflected on your own eyes is a cool twist on "See the world in my eyes."
Right off i see only thing I would change, because you seem to have captured that vengeance (even though it's human)always backfires and is not good.
And while that may seem judegmental on my part, it does take time to heal and that sort of crash is one that doesn't give up until we've drawn on all the rhetoric and played every scene over until we discover...we didn't do anything wrong.
Ah yes, the one thing, I would change is the title and just one small word to entice the reader..
"vengeance in broken mirrors" it opens the conversation with a shard and that is as it should be. But only if you like it, should you take as yours. Great job, a fine write as always. Thanks for sharing.
Just this to think of too: your beauty cannot leave you, because love takes no prisoners and leaves no victims.
one of these days you're going to realize you've blown past me in your poetic skill. i'm scrounging around for two or three lines a week and you're writing emotional pieces like this? now i'm jealous.
There is nothing in this work to bash, it is truly a beautiful poem. It is wonderful that you have such friends who have stuck by your side through these tough times. I know what it is like to want to be able to do something but not having the power to, leaves you helpless and you feel your friends pain, but most of the time all you have to do is listen, give that ear. I think that your friends will truly appreciate this token of gratitude. The third stanza is by far my favorite one, its a beautiful sort of selfishness is it not? you manage to master the feeling of need, and the strength that accompanies making it out of a tough situation. Beautifal poem, touching to say the least.
The universe in your eyes seems to express distance and a subtle pain of a beauty or freedom inside a person who is there but not all the way “there”, but still is seen and recognized for what it once was.
It seems like there is not much you can do for this person who has become “lost in the woods” – to rescue her/him. I sort of have the impression that this person was deeply wounded and that by taking vengeance would solve no cure for the damage already done.
The last line leaves me with a sense of sadness – that this person will never be the same.
Submission Name: vengence is broken mirrors
