Sylvia's Stillborn

[JoelJosol]

Maybe Sylvia was serious when she meant

of her bering generous with mother-love with her children-poems.

I am not a mother but have witnessed the parent-pain

for the still-born ones, who appeared to have normal limbs like lines

that flow from one to the next, as if alive

but no amount of inspiration or aspiration

will restore the dead words,

the still images in the mind.

[Tinker]

Hi Joel, Reading this was like a punch in the stomach. The hyphenated words were very effective. The opening is almost conversational then you pare the words down to the last couplet painting a silent portrait. I am a mother who lost a child before birth and the vacuum it left has been with me for 50 years. Time shades the memory but effective words can bring back yesterday.

 

Good writing. ~~Tink

[JoelJosol]

Thanks for reading Tink. I also lost a child at the moment of birth. So, when I read the poem of Sylvia Plath's Stillborn, I was prod to react to it with this poem. I tried not to cross-over to sentimentality but to stay matter of factly. I would have written "stilled images in the mind" but I am not sure of its correctness. I felt it would have echoed nicely with "dead words".

[David W. Parsley]

A courageous and difficult piece, Joel. Effectively delivered. I keep coming back to this treatment of one of the tragedies of the race.

 

Thank You (I think),

- Dave

[dcmarti1]

I cannot add anything to Tinker and Dave.