Choice Poem – Because He Hated the Way She Looked at the Man Next Door
Because He Hated the Way She Looked at the Man Next Door
The sunflower walls
of my bedroom never spoke kindly
to each other. They wailed
until my young ears
calloused and my pillow
soaked. So I twisted
the tiny spindle of my bedside
lamp, revealing night’s
true nature, which kissed
my eyes, and swept my mind
off into a familiar dream…
I’m riding a giant
creature that glides
in serpentine fashion
but has clanking, round, metal hooves
that gallop along a wooden trail
through the onyx sky. My vision
blurs as we jerk upside-down
and the hunter’s moon dances
on the surface of a dark tide.
A distant horn chirps a dizzy melody
into my ears and the twinkling fair
becomes clear just as…
my bedroom released
a short, hollow moan. The blistering
sunflower cracked my dark fortress,
and I am roused with suspicion.
I tip-toed downstairs
shadowboxing my feral imagination
and heard these walls weeping
wet crimson silk tears.
Momma was face down
and then I saw that hole
in her head he was always
screaming about.
-Coleman Clark
Tags: 302poetry, choice, choicepoem, section4
Posted on February 15th, 2010 at 1:18 pm
There is some amazing imagery in this poem. I feel like I’m lost in a dream while reading this…I can see the walls of a bedroom being littered with explosions of sunflowers. It is eerie to read how overwhelming the flowers were, and how they become contrasted with the “noxious black exhaust” that is used to describe what puts out the light. Is this blackness meant to represent a type of imagination? Because that’s what I convey from the scenes that come after, the “giant winged creature” and the “dripping jungle leaves”. This dream that I’m envisioning comes to a disturbing halt at the end however when you mention the hole in momma’s head. I maybe would have liked to have a little more insight as to what you mean by this – if this is a literal image, and if so, why/how have you come across it?
Posted on February 16th, 2010 at 4:01 pm
I really love this poem. The imagery borders on being too abstract, but I finished with a sense of where I was. It is explicit in its imagery to say the least, the poem being laced with similar content expressed by different words. The only complaint I have is the sunflower walls being too loud. I’m not sure how that opening is cohesive within the context of the rest of the poem. Maybe add exactly what was making the walls loud at that time specifically. Anyway, well done, very affected.
I know exactly what this is about I think.
And I have the same blog layout as you, copier.
Posted on April 11th, 2010 at 4:59 pm
This poem seems to have a very imaginative and surreal landscape that I really enjoy. I love the sunflower walls that are oddly unkind, it’s not what you would expect from sunflower walls. It’s as if the setting looks nice, but underneath the surface something’s wrong. There is an interesting juxtaposition of wonder and disturbance. I also kind of like how I’m not sure if the last couple lines of the poem really happened, or whether that’s a dream, it adds to the shock factor and disbelief I would feel if i saw my mom face down in front of me. However, I’m not sure if that’s what you were going for. I’m not exactly sure what the title implies either. It might help to add more details about your mom and the relation of the title to her.