Her posting last night makes six poems in less than a week, competing
with her out put from those glory days when she was angry with me.
On the surface, this most recent poem seems nostalgic (as did
its predecessor), but there is an under tone in both poems that belies the
surface appearance.
Coming this time of year, she may be searching for something
to be thankful for, but clearly is pained by the fact that she is spending this
holiday alone.
She smells a memory of cooking from past holidays, “of roasting
things” wafting into her work days, as well as her nights alone, where she gets
to celebrate by watching cooking shows on TV.
She looks back to a time when she was a little girl, when
she was unaware that it was the best time of her life, and back then had the
most to be thankful for.
“Too young to know better than to know it would probably never
be better,” she writes, an more than ever it was a good time to be thankful.”
By using words like “Phantom,” she makes it clear that the wholesome sense
that is promoted at this time of year is largely imaginary, and this undertone
is supported by her use of the word “mimic,” as she substitutes food television
shows, and goes on to make it clear than when she actually felt good about the
holiday, she was simply “too young to know better,” or in other words, how the
world really works.
The intense bitterness of the undertone plays against the
over sense of nostalgia to give this poem incredible potency. She spends her
nights alone, sitting watching food shows on television (instead of having
someone’s loving arms around her, sharing her time.”
And yet she is somewhat cynical, reflecting on how she didn’t
know in the past as a girl that it would never be better than it was.”
Unsaid, of course, is the fact that she did not have a happy
childhood for the most part, but in looking back, from this particular moment,
it seems happier than she currently is, painting a snap shot of her isolation.
The oddity in all this is that – despite all of her
stalkers, all of those men and women who profess to love her, all of those men
or women she could have with the snap of her finger, she can’t be with the one
she loves.
Yet, there is a sense in this poem, a kind of repeat of her
poems about living borrowed lives, that she is always really alone, even with
she is with people, even with that man she aches for.
This is an intensely sad poem, although I’m not certain if
she is sending a message to someone with it, or just reflecting on the reality
of her existence.
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