Teaching Poetry

What Do I Remember Of Your Death

By Sasha Forster

I remember sitting with you

Watching one of your favorite movies

And enjoying the relaxing day off of school

What do I remember of your death?

I remember asking if you wanted

anything from the kitchen

and your response was

a ragged half breath

What do I remember of your death?

I remember hoping that you were

Playing a game and that this

Was not really happening to you

(After all the doctor had just

Released you the day before

With a clean bill of health and only

The request that you stop drinking)

What do I remember of your death?

I remember the pain of having to make the choice

between life support and release.

How I was 18 and looked upon as the

Only one who could decide because

Your fiancée was to drunk or high or

Incompetent.

I remember the way that you used to

Smile so bright

And the doctor telling me you would

Never smile again

I remember thinking that

God will look after you now because

I am the one who

killed my mom.

My Three Poem Choices:

Proxy poem inspiration: WHAT DO I REMEMBER OF THE EVACUATION

Equal Opportunity and Two Prisoners

Proxy Poem

Finding beauty in the sunlight

You hold it in with all your might

Search the distance for good weather

Just to feel light as a feather

You look too far for happiness

Trying to live without regrets

Forgot to look down at your feet

Where your happiness and ground greet

No longer placed in barren soil

But standing in the deep green depths

Of your own self grown forest

Prentalcackler

Hoho the “boinnnng” of my mornin’ screen
My lifetop opens with a benevolent “ping”
Whilst cradling my first cup a joe with steam
What hast before me but 17 new eblings

One of which is all in cappsbacklers
I ponder for a momentarilous
Should I open something so nepharilous?
And dare the wrath of prentalcacklers

In my inbox stares this ebling glarin’
An innocent query for the teacher of grade 7
Full of boorishness, mosk and flemb
From someone lying on the DSM

Jonny sought solace, cried, and lamented
My teacher, she was so unfairish
She awarded me a not yet meeting
She’s so harsh I beseech you, give her a total mental beating

The prentlecacklers with tongue and widgets
Found the rubric crumpled in the backle-packet
And gasped oh no my little darlin’ midget
She’ll rue the day she dared fail someone from our tax bracket

I can’t speak French but his work it sounds so whimsy, so lyrical
Why Jonny is my baby, my darling, my miniature me
Why did you not give an A to my eccentric prodigy
I want your reasons, all empirical, why he did not meet your criterical

Look here Madame this work contrived from our genetic mutation
Is smart and creamy, it answered all the questions
My reply my dearest sir has not been hasted
You see his work was copy pasted

Sleek, black knock-off brand sunglasses stick to my face

Around my brow,

And sweat’s beading upon my forehead now

Above them, fighting hard to stay in place

Beads of sweat begin to trickle down slow.

I am done with this heat; it’s time to go.

Essence of Summer is thick in the air,

The scent of salt water: drowning my thoughts.

Fixed in the classroom I think it unfair

And frankly absurd that I am not free

To run to the beach to take some snapshots

Enjoying life, spending time by the sea.

I marveled at the thought, smile on my face.

But I must say

Walking to class does fill me with dismay,

And by Tuesday

Who knows what form my dreaming will embrace.

Ocean waves grand and small, come to meet my toes

On the sand, cool and fresh,

Each wave casting away all of my woes.

The Sun not only shines his rays of light,

He kisses my skin and tempts me to stay.

But he betrays me; his kiss burns my flesh.

And I keep returning to the beach, to

The Ocean’s spray

Of lies and broken promises; untrue!

But I have had my fill

Of the Summer’s myths and fables galore,

No more late night escapes up to the shore.

Nights go by and I hear the laughs, so shrill

And carefree, not tired or full of fright.

I might

For what it’s worth,

Take Summer back into my embrace, wary

Of the deceit, lies, and deceptions yet

To be unearthed.

One can know what troubles me,

The longing in my voice must make it clear.

Why must it be

So, that the bright Summers of yesteryear,

Long, dreamy, full of excitement and glee,

End with a dim sunset.

When I Consider How My Mind is Spent

When I consider how my mind is bent,
Ere most my life in this turnt sea and tide,
And that small gold which is key to thrive
Bound in me useless, though my heart more set
To fold within my Nature, and make seen
My own story, lest he upturnt reply,
“Doth life require clear skies, clarity denied?”
I humbly ask. But Knowing, to upset
That rumour, swift replies: “Life needs not
Either man’s unchanged mind or dyed eyes: His peace
Is nightly; generations at his bidding pry
Enlightenment from a clean slate, a hinged life:
They also thrive who in dreaming, are released.

August Evening

When did the wolf change?

When did he decide to step into the fire-warmed circle?

When did the wolf become a dog?

This dog right here, I mean–

the one who has settled by my side on the lawn chair,

the one who is gazing out into the vastness of the evening sky,

who is cocking his head

who is twitching his moist nose, sniffing life.

Now he fixes a stare on me, and says not a word but speaks volumes.

Now he wriggles in closer and nuzzles the crook of my arm.

I don’t know exactly what love is.

I do know how to search soulful eyes,

how to look for understanding and see myself,

how to bury my face in musky fur, how to revel in rancid kisses,

how to call and come in return,

how to walk side by side each day, how to be still and listen

Which is what I have been doing all evening.

Tell me, what else should I have done?

Aren’t dogs just a fanciful creature of our possession?

Tell me, what creature are you going to invite into your home,

To teach your heart to grow?

Ode to Vancouver

Assignment 2 poem analysis – Wang

Ode to Edgar Aetheling

by Antony José Ma Junior.

The last scion of Saxon Kings

Line of Cerdic House of Wessex

The last Witan proclaimed

Edgar Aetheling is next.

Born far away in exile

Of the House of Wessex

Blood of Alfred Great

Anglo-Saxon Rex

Harold Godwinson

Killed at Senlac Hill

The Anglo-Saxon rose

Cut down lying still.

The coronation must

For Edgar Aetheling

New Westminster Abbey

Royal prince in waiting

But it was not to be

The Witan did betray

Young Edgar Aetheling

And gave his crown away.

Edgar Rex Secundus

The rightful king he should have been

Of Anglo-Saxon England

Over all his English kin.

Taken by the Bastard

Never to be king

Began a fateful lifetime

Of serving other kings.

I say a prayer for Edgar

History’s footnote

No grave nor monument

Could you and I take note.

Colours of the rainbow fill the sky

Not a feeling in this world could top this high

Where once a world filled with helplessness and abuse

Now stands a mountain in front of me with endless possibilities

Memories of you used haunt me

Endless fear that your words would cut me deeper

An overwhelming feeling of emotion

You crushed my soul, broke my heart and played games with my mind

Oh, how I used to be so naive

Hanging on to very empty promise of yours with first my first clenched so tightly

Hoping for a better tomorrow

But reality sank in, I could no longer live this life

Your nothing but a sack of garbage, the scum on the bottom of my shoe

For this is the time that I stand up for myself and seal my destiny

Colours of the rainbow fill the sky

Not a feeling in this world could top this high

Now stands a mountain in front of me with endless possibilities