Spectre of debt

[vaneramos]

That poetry exercise yesterday stayed with me. Some of the phrases were especially fertile and inspired this new poem.

~~~~

Spectre of debt

Who is the unchanging shadow
that walks here,
snatching passersby?
We never see them again.
His appetite is larger
than all of my years.

He hangs over me
like a man with a big knife
surveying the edges of my life.

He takes my acre of field
and scorches the grass
dragging away all the brush
and burning it
scattering my ashes
on another man's land.

The wail of numbers
is breaking my sleep.

Mind rotting,
I run like a dog through corners
of my own meadow at night,
starlight stinging naked soil
and shattering my eyes
to diamond dust.
The summons
unsettles me
but instead of going
I cower here.

I wake every morning
but the dream keeps returning.
I wake in sweaty folds.
My heart smaller than the hole in my chest
rattles like a seed in its crinkled pod
dried by the worry of fire.

~~~~

Comments

debt

[(Anonymous)]

Hi Van, it's Elisabeth. I love the phrase "starlight stinging naked soil." The mood of this poem is intense. It's so sad that our lives must be pinched by financial anxiety. I think that's one of the reasons I love "Star Trek" -- for portraying a world where financial need is no longer the master of us all.

[stephe.livejournal.com]

Am I right in thinking this poem is somewhat darker than the poems you usually write? I'm not complaining, mind you: I like this a lot. The images, particularly in the first three stanzas, are very attention-grabbing, and like Tina, I enjoyed "The wail of numbers/is breaking my sleep."

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Definitely darker. I rarely write early in the morning, as I did today, because it's not my best time of day. Doing so seemed to tap a different part of my psyche.

[stephe.livejournal.com]

Before I make th foolowing comment, I would like to mention that my editing process usually involves cutting out huge amounts of text. Most of the poems I've posted on TSX were originally longer, sometimes twice as long.

Having said that: have you considered just ending the poem with "The wail of numbers/is breaking my sleep"? I think it would add a greater sense of mystery to the whole thing.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Interesting comment! Sound advice, in fact. All day long, I've felt the last two verses were flawed, but I didn't consider removing them. You're right; the first four stand on their own.

Ironically, it all started when I sat down this morning and started my handwritten journal with the passage, "I run like a dog....shattering my eyes to diamond dust." It led into three pages of stream-of-consciousness writing. From that I culled, rearranged and edited the lines of the poem.

That's when the opening got moved down. Now I realize it was just a psychological cough, a clearing of the throat before real ideas started to flow.