FEAR!!

Fear

by Dara Wier

Dara Wier

In fall when we went the roads

for the pure reason of pretending

we were still and the world fell

away all around us, the dry fall

kept my tongue circling my lips.

Think how many paths

circles cross. What range

the tongue bringing moisture

to chapped skin laps.

I watched my grandfather rub

petroleum jelly on his hearing aid

ear. Each of his possessions,

package of black tobacco,

jar of mentholatum,

and, collapsed around a gold coin

he never let me touch,

a leather pouch soft

as damp moss, greygreen,

a lesson. He leaned

and touched his hearing aid

battery to my mouth

to burn my lips, a silver spot

of circular burn that comes back,

do you regret knowing .

he took your hands around his testicles

when it is easy to believe

those nights taught you

how one thing becomes another

His back had been a thing burnt

black when he was brought home

from the clinic to recover

from anthrax. I would not touch

a thing he touched. I watched

the black crescents his fingernails

drew as he drew melon seeds

from cotton sacks or wrapped raffia

around the wounds his knife drew

for citrus grafts.

When he squeezed ichthyol salve

on my instep to draw the thick thorn

back, it healed.

The cusp of the deer’s hoof

is static in our headlights.

There, a blow we’ve taken,

movement in shadow near the road;

we’ve shied, recovered,

and watch for other dangers.

There is the rabbit

whose carelessness could kill us

but she freezes in our headlights

for the next car coming or the random

truck whose driver has no thought

for her or us. Think how many

times it’s crossed your mind,

will they kill us, will the deer

rushing across the road for water

batter his neck on the windshield,

will your swerve to miss another skunk

land us in a ditch. What’s out there

eager to satisfy need or desire

does not care, knows nothing

about the paths we cross.

My tongue without thinking

drives back another wad of tobacco

to soothe a black jacket’s sting.

Think of the traffic a tongue congests,

how the heart crosses and compares

what might not have been

drawn together. Under a perfectly beautiful

moon and on its opening evening

the new highway kills eleven dogs

in its surprising traffic.

 

 

 

 

          As I was reading this poem I realized that there was one BIG stanza and not really any rhyme scheme. She begins to talk about all different sorts of ideas and thoughts and feelings and really random subjects. I also realize that she also puts relevent things together but its mostly irrelevent things. She talks about feelings and thoughts a lot and everytime I read it, it seems to give me another thing  to think about and its always lead up to deep thoughts.

 

          I feel like she does these things purposly because what author doesnt want their reader to do a lot of deep thinking?? I dont think there is a rhyme scheme because in this type of poem it would ruin the thought and feeling of wanting to read it over and over again. Some poems sound good over and aover again when they have rhyming, but some poems are written without it for a reason. I have no idea why she put all of those random subjects in there but I'm thinking maybe because if we dont understand one line, maybe reading the next line and looking at it differently will help us get the full view and picture of the poem.

 

          I think the author wanted us to walk away thinking about all the different ideas that she smushed into one poem! I feel like this wasnt done intentionally, but it happened and I was amazed with the final product of her poem because it was AMAZING! I loved this poem so much and she really inspired me to write an amazing poem like this! <3