I
Was flat upon my chest
And crawling on the ground
Trying to keep
My small head down
My brother in the grass
Dressed up in army green
Back where we
Two could not be seen
And then I heard a crack
And saw him
Still
Like a GI Joe
Left out on the bedroom floor
this poem scares me……….. Care to tell me what it’s all about? I for the life of me can’t figure it out!!!!!! Is your brother dead!?!?!!!!!! I’m confused….
This will take some explaining.
I had been listening to Pentatonix’s cover of the song “White Winter Hymnal”. If you don’t know it, the lyrics are:
I
Was following the pack
All swallowed in their coats
With scarves of red
Tied ’round their throats
To keep their little heads
From falling in the snow
And I turned
‘Round and there you go
And Michael, you would fall
And turn the white snow
Red
As strawberries
In the summertime
I borrowed the metrical pattern (loosely) as an exercise (and included that in the tags on the post). Since that song seems to be about some sort of memory of childhood, used one of my own, an early memory of my brother and I playing “army” back in our backyard.
One other feature of the original song lyric, however, is the ambiguity of what turns the “white snow red” – it has spurred a lot of different interpretations, and I liked that feature. Since, in my memory, my brother was still (he was actually listening for what had made the sound, and trying to stay still as a covert soldier might if they sense approaching danger), I deliberately preserved the sense of ambiguity, which people could be free to interpret.
Which I am ruining now by explaining. But I hate the thought of worrying anybody.
Thanks for reading. Sorry to have alarmed you.
Ok thank goodness he’s alive!! Phew…. For a second there I thought your earliest childhood memory is of your brother dying next to you or something (as you can see I’m nit very good with poems…..)!!!
Thank you for explaining 🙂