deepundergroundpoetry.com
The Death of Ben Tuttle Age Eight
I'm looking at an old photograph
You posed with us in cut-offs
Standing in the sprinkler flexing
Muscles, smile flaring
There was a day swiming over my aunt's house
And the time in the shed, all alone
You got a stomach ache laughing
Over my hard-on
First came the fevor
The doctor visits
Then
The vomiting
The fevers
The cough
The night sweats
The doctor visits
The delusions
The hospital
The ventilator
The death
All in a week, 1978
I shouldn't have teased you so often.
You posed with us in cut-offs
Standing in the sprinkler flexing
Muscles, smile flaring
There was a day swiming over my aunt's house
And the time in the shed, all alone
You got a stomach ache laughing
Over my hard-on
First came the fevor
The doctor visits
Then
The vomiting
The fevers
The cough
The night sweats
The doctor visits
The delusions
The hospital
The ventilator
The death
All in a week, 1978
I shouldn't have teased you so often.
Published 18th Feb 2011
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Commenting Preference:
The author encourages honest critique.
I like your description, how you fill in the specifics of a life,
the transition, the short list of dying. The two distinct parts
contrasting 'life' and 'dying'. Yeah, cool, like it. Except:
I think you should get rid of that last line:
"I shouldn't have teased you so often."
It breaks the intensity, collapses the image you've built by switching to
the narrator's thoughts. But maybe it's me, I just *hate* summation lines.
(Ask Jack Heslop (Heslopian), I've abused him about this very thing.)
typos: "There was a day swiming over my aunt's house"
swimming, missing 'at'
the transition, the short list of dying. The two distinct parts
contrasting 'life' and 'dying'. Yeah, cool, like it. Except:
I think you should get rid of that last line:
"I shouldn't have teased you so often."
It breaks the intensity, collapses the image you've built by switching to
the narrator's thoughts. But maybe it's me, I just *hate* summation lines.
(Ask Jack Heslop (Heslopian), I've abused him about this very thing.)
typos: "There was a day swiming over my aunt's house"
swimming, missing 'at'
19th Feb 2011 5:36am
19th Feb 2011 5:41am
