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Mar 07
poem 15 comments challenge: Parkland: A letter for the victims
Firegirl03

Valentine's Day, 2018

vpr-commentaries-stats-20180314.mp3
Firegirl recorded her piece which is attached here and was aired on Vermont Public Radio on March 14. 

When you told your mom you loved her
before you caught the bus this morning,
you meant it in the way a teenager means it
when they kiss their mother on the cheek,
cereal on their breath,
backpack on their shoulder,
head in a million places.
You meant it in the way that assumes
you will see her that evening after track practice,
in the way that assumes
you will seal the day with another I love you
before you turn out the light. 

When you told your mom you loved her
at 2:21pm on February 14th, 2018, 
with saliva choking in your throat,
you meant it in the way you could never mean anything else in your life.
You meant it as an apology
and a cry for help
and a plea for her to hold you like she did when you were little,
and the monsters in your dreams were stuck in your head. 
Mom, the monsters are real this time,
I swear it.
They're real and they're just around the corner.
They're real and their teeth are bullets that bite the backs
of friends who did not have time to tell their mothers they loved them.
They're real and I'm so
so scared.


I love you. 
You can't hear over the scream of your heartbeat.
You can't feel over the heat of blood in your veins. 
You can't see behind the black spots in your eyes.
I love you. 
You are sorry for everything you ever did wrong.
You are repenting for every sin you might have committed.
You are praying to every god you didn't think you believed in.
I love you. 
You are penning eulogies for the words you never said. 
You are penning eulogies for the life you never lived.
You are penning eulogies for your classmates in the next room over.
I love you, Mom.
And I mean it this time.
I mean it as the Valentine's Day card I didn't write you,
as the consolation for missing dinner last night,
as the apology for every time I took for granted that I'd have another chance to say it. 

The monsters found out where I go when I'm awake, Mom,
and this time you're not here to fend them off.


. . .

I love you, too.
Is everything
okay?

 
Audio download:
vpr-commentaries-stats-20180314.mp3
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Posted: 03.07.18
About the Author: Firegirl03
MSG / CONTACT
RECENT LOVES
  • SoundCheck on Friday, March 16 -- You Spoke Out
  • I Will Never Know
  • I Did
  • Among Other Things
  • America
RECENT COMMENTS
  • Thank you for taking the time
  • Thank you. It's heavy stuff.
  • Thank you; I wanted to write
  • Thanks, Geoff. I am planning
  • Thank you. I'm glad you were

Other Posts by Author

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  • Home is Where the Heart Is
    My heart makes its home in a body that rejects it.My heart is a vital organ; Read more
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  • Blue
    Read more
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Discussion

Comments

  1. Love to write
    Mar 08, 2018

    I really, really like this. I can hear the person saying it in their head and it really pulls me along at a fast pace. I love the half-baked metaphor of the monsters because that’s definitely how it feels... kinda like a bad dream.

    Life is not a paragraph.

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  1. Firegirl03
    Mar 08, 2018

    Thank you. I'm glad you were drawn into it, however awful the thought of that may be.

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  1. gg
    Mar 08, 2018

    Firegirl,
    I hope you will come March 14 and present this poem at SoundCheck at Burlington City Arts. This grabs me, moves me. It works. Profoundly.

    My only thought might be to take the last three lines out of italics (underline?) so that it's clearer that it's Mom that is speaking. You'll also have to figure out how the sound of your voice might change for those lines, how you present it differently so we can inherently understand the difference between the narrator thinking and the Mom speaking (or texting).

    You want to record this?

    g

    YWP founder. Current work: Instagram, Mastodon and https://geoffreygevalt.com
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  1. Firegirl03
    Mar 08, 2018

    Thanks, Geoff. I am planning to come to the SoundCheck, and it's definitely going to be a struggle to figure out how to present this. I'll think about different ways to make it clearer that the mother is speaking at the end.

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  1. gg
    Mar 08, 2018

    You might try recording it and posting it and I can give you some feedback. Additionally, you could come to the workshop, share and get some advice from Rajnii, Denise and some of the others.

    I made it the Daily Read.
    thank you.

    YWP founder. Current work: Instagram, Mastodon and https://geoffreygevalt.com
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  1. Icestorm
    Mar 08, 2018

    This is very powerful. Unlike most pieces about the recent shooting, this poem really captures the blur of action and the tragedy of the event. I like how it's in second person; it allows the reader to really connect with the narrator. I don't really have any suggestions, but if you wanted to, you could add a short paragraph between the first and second summarizing the event in the moment with one or two lines. It might help the poem flow a bit smoother. But thank you for sharing, it's a great piece.

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  1. Firegirl03
    Mar 08, 2018

    Thank you; I wanted to write something less preachy and more focused on the terror of an event like this and how no one deserves to through it. Thanks for the suggestion about a possible interlude; I'll think on it.

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  1. CatLover
    Mar 09, 2018

    all I have to say is that if I cried at stuff like movies or books or music or poems I would be sobbing.

    Grace

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  1. Firegirl03
    Mar 09, 2018

    Thank you. It's heavy stuff.

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  1. Nightheart
    Mar 10, 2018

    This is just such a powerful piece of writing, and I just choked up while reading it because I can feel the raw humanness coming from every ounce of this poem, and it is beautiful. My favorite line is probably //Mom, the monsters are real this time, I swear it, They're real and they're just around the corner, They're real and their teeth are bullets that bite that backs of friends who did not have time to tell their mothers they loved them// You take this human fear of the monster under the bed, and you make it so very real. Thank you so much for writing this poem.

    "remember, we are infinite"

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  1. gg
    Mar 10, 2018

    Well put, Nightheart. I too was moved by that passage.

    Thanks for sharing your thoughts with the author.

    gg

    YWP founder. Current work: Instagram, Mastodon and https://geoffreygevalt.com
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  1. Firegirl03
    Mar 20, 2018

    Thank you for taking the time to respond. I am humbled that my words were able to bring you into the moment and give you empathy for the victims. It's a chilling reminder that this could be any of us.

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  1. Saia_Patel
    Mar 14, 2018

    Firegirl,
    This piece was so moving to me from the first time I read it to the last time [right before I posted this]. Each time I read it, I almost cried each time, because it just became better and better.I love how you captured the intense emotions and feelings that go along with this event and incorporated it into this unrestrained poem. Thank you so much for posting this...I'm glad I got to read it.

    poetry is eternal graffiti written in the heart of everyone

    - lawrence ferlinghetti

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  1. gg
    Mar 17, 2018

    I was crestfallen to discover that a power loss on the camera Friday night had resulted in my having missed recording your performance of this poem at SoundCheck. But it still is firm in my mind. And others'. Audience members told me they cried. So did Rajnii and Denise.

    I've had four people say they heard it on VPR, one pulled over to listen and think. A FB friend is writing me a letter to send to you.

    This moved people, Firegirl.

    Be well.

    YWP founder. Current work: Instagram, Mastodon and https://geoffreygevalt.com
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  1. gg
    Mar 18, 2018

    I wanted you all to see the comment I was sent by a friend this morning, the former director of Vermont Stage Company. Here's what he said about this piece, upon hearing it on VPR:

    Hi,

    Last week I was listening to VPR when your poem came on. I'm not sure I've ever had such a strong and immediate emotional reaction to a piece of writing before, and certainly not poetry.

    After the first stanza set the scene, the second stanza blew me away. When I heard the date, my eyes widened and immediately filled with tears. And then it just didn't stop. Image after heartbreaking image.

    The final line cracked me wide open.

    You captured the universal in the intimately personal. I'm not a parent, but I felt as deeply as I imagine a parent would.

    Your piece is beautiful and devastating and transformational. I believe change comes not as much from presenting the hard facts, as from opening hard hearts, and your poem certainly has the potential to do that.

    I hope it's okay that I shared it on my Facebook page. If you go there, you'll see how moved so many others were.

    Thank you,

    Mark Nash

    YWP founder. Current work: Instagram, Mastodon and https://geoffreygevalt.com
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