Distance Lost, Lost, My Son, Boogie Man
"Mommy..."
"Yes son?"
He looks at her,
stares at her.
"Could you close the closet door?"
he whispers.
She smiles.
He thinks her teeth,
too sharp,
too sharp in this pale light.
"Of course, son. Can't have the Boogie,
Boogie Man come out of the closet,
and steal your soul."
She goes to the closet door,
closes it to a crack,
hand still on the knob,
turns to her son with that same smile, winks,
closes the door completely with a thud.
"Thank you,"
he whispers,
laying back as his mom goes to the door,
goes to the door on her way out,
turns off the light,
still smiling,
still her son looking at her,
staring at her.
He is now alone,
in the dark,
eyes open,
then close,
open,
then close like the closet door.
Then open,
and so is that closet door,
he sees,
and he doesn't want to look too hard at it,
doesn't want to stare,
'cause how did that door open on its own,
why can't he just be left alone,
no lectures, he's tired of learning,
knowing.
The fiend
stands in the closet doorway,
looking,
staring
at the boy,
mocking in every way.
"So little boy, boy, what shall we learn tonite,"
the fiend asks,
its voice full,
but behind it, speaking,
always behind the speaker,
in the closet,
tucked away in another dimension.
"It's just that,"
the boy says,
"it's that,"
he continues,
voice low,
looking,
staring,
"the job's so hard, very difficult. I don't know, I just..."
"None of us ever knew,"
the fiend's lips moving,
voice coming from behind him,
PERHAPS AT THAT FAR DISTANCE SCREAMING
yet now barely heard.
"But it's the way of the world, little boy, little boy. 'Accept and be glad', sayeth the Lord."
The boy looks at the door his mother exited from,
wishing it was the door she had entered from,
at least she would be in the room with him now to say goodbye,
but she isn't,
she's thinking her thoughts far away,
far away,
not knowing she's going to lose
and gain
a son
at the same time this night.
"All us Boogie Men were once children,
and all us Boogie Men will be children once again,"
the fiend says.
"I'm tired of souls,
little souls for breakfast,
fears for lunch,
dreams for dinner.
Come,
boy,
little boy,
I've taught you my ways,
spells,
take my place,
nightmare,
know my world.
I just want a voice for once,
one close at my side."
The boy,
looking,
staring,
accepts,
trades places,
and the first soul he has that day,
for breakfast,
instead of cereal,
is his mother's
son's
imposter
Feedback Links
1)https://oc.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/5cv3xd/i_love_mondays/ 2)https://oc.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/5czhm9/an_albatross_for_america/
Posted Nov 15, 2016, 3:10 AM UTC · edited
I'm sorry but what you have here is prose. You've formatted it as a poem but it's really written like a story. Try posting this in a different sub and you may get better feedback.
It's prose poetry. There is a relatively large literary tradition in this type of poetics. Just google it.
http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/p-as_docs/PoetryandProse.pdf
While you've formatted your post as a poem, the language is prosaic. If you want to argue that it's poetry I can't definitively tell you that it isn't. However, I can say that this definitely falls closer to the prose side of the spectrum.
I'm not going to remove it but if you want to get feedback and improve your writing, you really should post this somewhere else.
The construction of the lines would make this an awkward prose read. 'He looks at her,/stares at her', or 'He thinks her teeth/too sharp/too sharp/in this cold light', are not prosaic.
It's prose poetry, closer to spoken word. 'The boy,/looking/staring/accepts/trades places/and the first soul he has that day,/for breakfast/instead of cereal/is his mother's/son's/imposter'.
Try reading it out loud to yourself to hear the rhythm of the lines.
I'm not trying to defend myself from criticism. But I'm guessing you're the moderator of the poetry section here, so your lack of nuance when it comes to poetry, coupled with the fact that you have the power to "remove it", is a little disconcerting.
Again, just google. How about Ginsberg's HOWL:
'I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix, angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machin- ery of night...'
Poe's THE RAVEN:
'Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore— While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. “’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door— Only this and nothing more.”'
It's just prose poetry. There's a really long tradition in it in poetics.