I wake up, fetal position in bed
Before the alarm promptly rings 3x
A list of things to do in my head
The day looks neat as a cereal box,
And roads dilute in the rain, driv-
ing, a man crosses the street:7:27 am
& I will always make that traffic stop/
deja vu unfolds as I go the office, file
& type, straight-jacket inside my cube.
Cars & trucks zip & zoom, marching
outside my window, same beat, 100+
kph down the freeway. During lunch
break, I peer outside.
The trees & flowers are bright in their
plant boxes. Plastic tables dot along
the mirror walls. Time snails, linear
in my phone & laptop. Some/ /times
words press & simmer, then fade 2x-
driving straight home. The night
sparks my thoughts, out of the shadows,
weightless as seeds on my eyelids, f r a g i l e,
weightless as seeds on my eyelids, f r a g i l e,
as silk
worms, c r aw l i n g
o u t o f
t h e
b o x.
Posted for D'verse Poets Pub - This is my typical work day and writing is done in between & mostly at night. I basically used numbers, city sounds, shapes & formatting my words on the page. Let me know what else worked for you ? Thanks ~
Picture credit: Silvia Grav
sounds so well and sometimes I sleep in fetal postion ! and sometimes I pray in this position and finally sleep:)
ReplyDeleteMake smile the cereal box! OMy
xo
Love how you manage to show the stress of a day at work the stress... and only a little outside peeping in, and an evening when the stressful order disintegrate...
ReplyDeleteha. nice structure to this...rather a box...until it breaks out a bit there in the end...i can feel the constraint, the same old same a bit...the straight jacket...i wore that once, with a neck tie...smiles...oh to be a worm wiggling my way out that box...smiles....
ReplyDeleteemailing you something...
Corrected my typo error ~ Ha, thanks ~ I like to be that worm too ~
DeleteI enjoyed the passage through your day, clipped and crisp and clean.>KB
ReplyDeletenice...i like how you play with the form to underline what you say... ugh....life can be a tight box in a corporate full time job...def. feel you in this...and the crawling out...some fresh air...a bit of freedom...just to snap back in... so felt..
ReplyDeleteOh, Grace, such a poem of contrasts -- really picturesque. Well painted.
ReplyDeleteThe uniformity of the lines and the spacing add so much to your atmosphere of constraint and stress. By the end of the poem I am longing to break free and breathe deeply through your loosened lines. The mirroring of form reinforces the fragility and limited time of that liberty. The diction and your use of numbers does give the sense of rush and business and also that all this hurry doesn't move time forward quickly. Marvelously done.
ReplyDeletefelt the tension
ReplyDeleteWell i would sure like to be the worm squirming free of the 9 to 5 crap, but I would not want a worm in this chap haha
ReplyDeleteI feel fragmented,stilted, disjointed or conflicted is the better word? Great tension, a sense of confinement. And then the juxtaposition, silk, fragile, worm. Love the contrast. Enjoyed.
ReplyDeleteThis is really good, love your visuals and the way your words and lines bring tension and movement.
ReplyDeleteTime can never go fast enough when you want it to. I, too, work in a cubicle and sometimes the end of the day can never come as fast as I would like. Smiles.
ReplyDeleteA vivid depiction of your day. I liked all of the detail, Grace. I understand how sometimes words can press, and simmer, and fade. I just had a thought here, Grace. Perhaps your days are spent inside the box, and at night your words take you out of the box.
ReplyDeleteYes Mary, my whole day is inside the cubicle ~ Good thing I am in the corner with a big big window ~ Thanks for your visit ~
DeleteI like this poem a lot and the way you used all the poetic devices punctuation, word placement etc. The grinding servitude of work is very well expressed.
ReplyDelete... boxes on the hillside, little boxes, made of ticky tack ...
ReplyDeleteSome words of a song you reminded me of. Your images and figures always work for me. "A day as neat as a cereal box" stopped me first--Neat? Gosh! And then it was--normal, prompt, neat, and as usual "time snails"! and diction! unfold, cube, straight jacket, marching, plant boxes, dots, etc. No lightness until dark. Only the worms confused me, seemed down-ish when the narrator is lifting up-ish.
Love, love this! The cubicle and the daily grind and then the space where something happens--view outside, night falls,crawling the only escape outside the box. Excellent job with the enjambment and diction, almost breathless, as the air leaks out and the box caves in.
ReplyDeleteyou dropped us into a place a day as every other cereal boxes can be many things as can this Grace you dropped me into many thoughts as i read through and i liked a lot
ReplyDeleteThis is so cleverly laid out. It gave me a sense of the mundane, which can be claustrophobic in its monotony, but then there were those breaks...searching for something else. Great stuff : )
ReplyDeleteFelt the squeeze, now i have to go worm my way out
ReplyDeleteI like this poem very much. Well written and felt.
ReplyDeleteI see this as a tender portrait of someone coping well with the rat race,
ReplyDeleteI like the metaphors at work here Grace. How we are constrained not only physically but also mentally as well.
ReplyDelete"Time snails." Love that.
ReplyDeleteelegant in tone and composition, creative in your use of tropes and physical space. I admire the sense of the skyscraper being pierced - outside - then the worms crawling (I also envisioned roots of a tree growing out.) ~ M
ReplyDeleteLove your work Grace but you lost me at alarm clock.
ReplyDeleteVery nice !
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed it!
Grace, LOVE how this poem "unfolds" from the carefully modulated words and dry meanings to the slipping-out-of-work-clothes freedom of the glittering, freewheeling format. The wording rolls along perfectly wtih the format as well. One of your best, Grace, and thx for commenting at Sharp Lil. Amy
ReplyDeleteI echo above comment. I, too, enjoyed how your poem unfolded So vivid, I could see it so clearly.
ReplyDelete