Girl With Spring In Her Belly~

When I was little I ate flowers

 

Roses found themselves on my tongue

petal by petal

chrysanthemums singed my bow lips with pollen

my smile was Cheshire

a belly full of sunshine

 

When I was little I was scolded for eating flowers

Father said I was enchanted mad enough as it was

no need to push the envelope of sanity

while the handmaid bawled I would die

from eating flowers

and it was that dread warning I remembered

when

in a foreign garden

on a lonely spring day

I ate every bloom

in an alien garden

waiting for the rains to drown me

but all I got for my troubles

was a lousy hospital gown

with an open back

a proper scolding

and a herb garden for my windowsill

a deterrent

which worked

until the next spring

when a rose decided to bloom

in a container of chocolate mint

I named her Paradox

bit her wit from the stem

grew wise

a lot more cheeky

and tad more impossible

for which all I got was a lousy t shirt

with ‘Rutgers Mental Health Center’ in blue

above the left breast pocket

 

I used to eat flowers when I was a little girl

now I keep them in a vase next to little blue pills

I never touch

and a glass of water I pour into the vase

each night

 

 

copyright:2010vssmd/amusemusepress

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Author's Note

~medicating idiosyncracies~numbing down a nation~ destroys its capacity for expressive enchantment~ who is to say what is normal and what is abnormal~ how convenient to label everything a behavioural disorder to the point where everyone believes it and everyone is sweetly numb and going with epic lemming flow over the cliffs~

Reviews

[nono]

Very nice, I wrote a poem like this. Only it has to do with ADHD. One time this kid in my class said "I think I have ADHD, and then he said wait. is that the learning disability one?" And I wanted to yell at him for that, i understand not knowing, but i hate it when people just act out, because they want to be sick. ADHD isn't the hardest thing to live with but it isn't the easiest thing either don't get me wrong, but when you get older it turns into something else. A fantastic write, because I can relate taking a pill everyday because no one wants to deal with you bouncing off the walls while your miserable and people can't even understand...Thank you. An amazing write, and it really kept me going reading this!! Keep up the great work!

[GTVile]

Wow. This is the most powerful thing I've read in a long while. Its strange how it can say so much in such a simple delivery mechanism. You really write from an unusual but fully captivating perspective, and you never bore. Great job.

[Annie]

Wonderful piece with some powerful lines. I especially liked, "my smile was Cheshire" and "in a foreign garden/on a lonely spring day/I ate every bloom/in an alien garden." The repetition works well for you there.
You are not bound by rhyme, form, or line breaks. Wonderful talent! You let it come right out of you.
It seems a bit choppy here..."a deterrent/which worked/until the next spring/when a rose decided to bloom/in a container of chocolate mint." It also starts to transition at this point from being very much like a fairy tale to more informal and colloquial. Not sure how well that works for me...I think I prefer the more formal tone from the beginning and end.
Really great piece, so powerful! You communicate some of the profundities of the illness.

[paul]

sensationally beautiful. really profoundly unique

[Stammers]

I LOVE this. I'm just going to put it into my favourites, that says more than a clumsy review could.

[Alicia Schroeder]

This writting is blooming with floral desire, I loved it, I eat edable flowers on salad, they are oh so divine.. Great write

[J.M]

Enchanting and bursting with originality. I love the idea which I completely agree with, normalcy is like an undefined idea of an imaginary object. I also thought the execution was fantastic. I especially love the personification of the flowers, like making them wise etc and the mix of ideas with objects. Very effective.

[Eustacia]

This is different and indeed enchanted, I liked the vibe of it and the story. Nice lines and phrases, well written!

[Sweets]

Nice poem :)
Great job on this x)

[Christopher Stone]

"A belly full of sunshine" What a lovely discription, I wish it was mine.
Medication is the same as locking one away, I hate normalacy, because I dont know what it is, who has the authority to decide anyway? if we all look different why cannot we act dirrerently, Who could ever be a judge?
I read this twice, and I shall again, because I enjoyed it, and what it did not say, C.