Poem for Thursday April 13, 2023 Is It Enough? Jill

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jill stockinger

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Apr 12, 2023, 12:27:32 PM4/12/23

to Rennaissance writing Group, Robert L. Smith, Kaolin Fire, Max Stockinger, Karen Arenson, Rose Fratti, Kathleen Kauffroath, Kim Knighton, Kimberlee Wilson, Victoria Smith

I had sent this to a few of you for suggestions. I have continued working on it. (I did remove "steamroller.")

So this is being presented to the whole group for our Thursday discussion on April 13, 2023. Suggestions welcome. Jill

Is It Enough?            by Jill Stockinger

You take my lips first, then my
tongue, my teeth.
Next you take my hair,
my eyes, my hands,
my throat, and I hear you
grinding my heart in your
moist, red mouth. Despairing,
I wonder, Is it enough?
Blasting back, your answer
roars and flattens me,
an annihilating cry,
“It is never enough!”

I recoil at the thought of all the bodies
you have eaten, all the bodies
that are buried inside you.

Suddenly, the howling, spinning
cyclone that is you
spits out all the parts of me,
and the wind, which is your loud
male voice, screams accusingly,
“Your scales are cutting me;
you are too hard—
too sharp, too bitter, too hard!”

Your voice continues, like a drum
banging in anguished vituperation,
“I hate you. You tricked me! How could you?”

With a hum almost like a benediction,
my parts touch and join.  I grow whole;
my scales shine as if you polished them.
You are the one who poisoned my love,
I muse; proudly, I declare in ringing tones,
“I will never give myself like that again.”

My sisters arrive to groom me:
they brush my long, lustrous hair,
powder my face, rouge my cheeks, put
a brighter sheen on my mermaid scales.
“You look like an angel,” they chorus
melodiously, and then depart.

Sitting on the rocks, I sing my song.
A passing sailor, caught in my spell,
is turned wild with desire for me,
but this time, I am the one saying
contemptuously, “It is not enough,”
and I am the only one taking.

Poem Jill Is It Enough?.docx

Helen Cooper

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Apr 12, 2023, 1:27:44 PM4/12/23

to Rennaissance writing Group, Robert L. Smith, Kaolin Fire, Max Stockinger, Karen Arenson, Rose Fratti, Kathleen Kauffroath, Kim Knighton, Kimberlee Wilson, Victoria Smith, jill stockinger

Dear Jill,

Your poem read really well and presents intriguing images. No changes necessary.

Helen

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