NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 11

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY11
THE THING YOU DIDN'T CHOOSE
RWP member Angie Werren invites us to write about the choice we didn’t make: Everyday we make choices. Some are small: English breakfast or Lipton? the highway or back roads? Some are more significant: convertible or mini-van? farmhouse or condo? Some choices lead us straight into the life we’re living, but for this poem, think about one of the things in your life you didn’t choose. Be concrete. Pick an object — something tangible* — and write your poem directly to it, as if you were writing it a personal letter. Explain why you didn’t choose it. What could things have been like if you had? Talk about what your life has become without it. See where the “confession” takes you. *As an alternative, dig a little deeper and write your poem to a person you left behind.

HERE'S MINE:

NUMBER SIX

in the playground

you said you would

be my friend forever,

forty years ago,

the same day you

choked my mum to death

Hollywood and the

movie actors told me

you were cool too

I dreamed of passing

clouds of making a

lucky strike on TV

it took me thirty five

years to figure you out,

when you told me

I was dying for you,

you really should have

told me that you

were killing me little

by little forty times a

day and all that money

that went up in flames,

trusting you was my first

mistake I could have

lived longer, healthier,

taken a holiday, bought

myself a brand new car

or played a game of tennis

11042+10

Day 11 2009

HOME PAGE