Her - Shakespeare's Monkeys

Her

I did love her.
Though I never distanced myself
far enough to utter it aloud.

I watched her
ready herself to delight the boys.
She was a venture they all
rallied themselves around
awkward and hard for her
rejection.

In her stillness,
we talked of miseries, dreams.
I brushed her hair out of tangle
and expectation so again
she could laze in shades that
perhaps I had placed her in.

She was everything
sun-soaked and delicate
that I longed to comprehend.
There was no perfection about her
but her smile was a sermon

and I prayed for every breath.

Anstey -
Some really fabulous lines in here Amanda.

I do wonder about this:
"Yes, I loved her
burning silently"
It seems a bit odd, the idea of her burning... though i realize it's you burning. Im' not sure you want both of you burning there but seriously that was the first thing that popped in my head.

Amanda Baker -
You're right. The whole last stanza is really annoying me.

Anstey -
Maybe if you politely, but forcefully, asked it to behave it might offer a solution that would be more amicable for both of you?

Amanda Baker -
I've tried that. I write such unruly poems.

Mosquitobyte -
*Offers chitinous talons to bring last stanza into line*

Celticlion -
I write unruly poems, too. It's a pain, but then where would we be without all the suffering? hehehe. I love your poem. The beginning seemed a tad bumpy around the boys (ain't it always?) but I wonder if some of it might be smoothed out with reformatting/line break changes (?)-Just an idea. I hate it when people start rewriting my poems, so I won't dissect yours unless I know you want that sort of vivisection- I mean, nothing scalpel-ish. Just ideas about the formatting. The poem has a wonderful, edgy fragility- well, that sounds vague as hell. I experienced it as you having a passionate ambivalence, despite being madly in love on some level with this girl, and your ambivalence, rather than weakening your love, makes it all the more potent. And that is the mystery, the spiritual/psychoreligious whatevver you choose to call it, "sermon"....It's a marvelously conceptualised piece of writing and I enjoyed reading it very much. Thank you...C

Anstey -

i think the 'far' in the first stanza is extra.

Amanda Baker -

That's it?? Really?

Anstey -

No. But it was a place to start.

Amanda Baker -

yeah...this one needs work...and I will get to it...one day

Norm -

Whatever you decide, please don't change those last three lines. They are gorgeous.

Amanda Baker -

Thank you Norm.