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Bottleneck (Free verse) by Cha no Onna
There is so much to say and no way to say it
Fifteen people trying to get through one door
And I'm sitting here, still. I'm the marble statue
In the wind-swept garden, and I dunno how much more
I can take it.
The calm can only go so deep, y'know
It gets me through the day, it helps me to do my job
To live my life, to run my game. But the rage flickers
Through and it shatters this last frail gasp of
Quiet.
I should come, as I did as a child, to my punishment
All willing, having already peed, because I knew
They wouldn't hit me hard if I was docile. Not like
The Others, who ran and hid and screamed
And were beaten.
I am the good child, the snot-nosed brat,
The responsible one, the failure. The mistake.
I am patience and imperfection and I am too small
To win. I am in turn beautiful and ugly, a comfort and
Untouchable.
Someday they'll put away their knives and let me live
In peace instead of in pieces and I will not be
afraid.
Someday commercials won't cut like cardboard. Someday
Grave dirt will cake my feet. Someday I will grin in
Savagery and holiness.
Someday, when I have righted the wrongs, solved the
Problems, supported the world. Someday there will be
No victims for me to redeem, like Mary, like the
Pelican in her piety, feeding her young her own blood.
Someday I'll die.
Votes: (green: user, blue: anonymous)
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Arithmetic Mean: 5.4375
Weighted score: 5.385349
Overall Rank: 3213
Posted: April 14, 2002 1:58 AM PDT; Last modified: April 14, 2002 1:58 AM PDT
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Comments:
251 view(s)
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Very Ginsberg-like.