Saturday, December 8, 2012

Sweet Baby Jesus, It's The Sort Of Annual Charity Poetry Contest Again

My mom sent me a check for the holidays, so I'm doing the charity poetry contest again. Here's how it works: You put a poem in the comments section. For every poem, I put $5 in the hat. When it's Dec. 25 or I run out of money, whichever comes first, the contest is over. I decide the best poem. The winning poet gets to decide what charity the money goes to.

Here's mine, and it just might win. So there.

Tantrum
Why didn't I get the shining snake?
Why didn't I get the sweet call, what's wrong?
I got the pencil stub, the vending machine crackers
Settling in my root chakra. My stomp
Sounds like why. Why. I didn't work
Enough, I didn't stand up, turn my back,
Raise my hand, just stop working.
Dance. The gun's always aimed at the dirt
At my feet, not at my feet, you know it,
I know it, why fight it, why ask?
I didn't spend enough time with cold hands
In cold spidery rooms, I spent too much time scratching,
I spent too much. I didn't buy the right presents.
I was breathing way, way, way wrong, you know,
Yes, no, I don't know where I went
Wrong. Nodding. It was that night
I drove home and in that overturned bowl of stars
The road dipped under, my hands reached up
And knocked at the sky, smacked, banged
At the sky, shouting, let me in, me, me, let me in!

Photo: Still from an animated student film from Newcastle University of The Little Match Girl, by Lulu Su and Yajing Cai. Isn't it like the most horrifying story? Especially when she just says fuck it and burns them all.