Poetry: Not There (Don’t Look)

Poetry Writing Contest response

Not there Don’t look there

Not there A fade a cut-away from the scene an edit that takes us somewhere else

Not there seems distant like a dream like the home you inhabit is not yourself

Not there that creeping feeling of frailty even in a strong frame makes others look away

Not there change the edit, they must not see

Not there — it’s only a spectre left behind, a broken mind that sings a strangled dream

Not there change the scene, no witnesses to this this is not the pretty kind of sadness the kind where ladies in corsets swoon with the back of their hand raised to their foreheads — it’s not that kind of languorous longing, not that kind of yearning ennui what it is — the thing that you’re hiding is the true face of melancholy.

Not there Don’t look there Please Don’t look there

Poetry Contest Prompt #4: Write a moody poem based on one of these emotions — bewildered, cantankerous, enthralled, or melancholy.

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