These "Moments" aren't really poems, because they have no structure at all. But they definitely aren't stories, they have no plots. They only capture a feeling or situation, a "moment" in time...
Now she has grown old.
Her friends have all died,
And age turned away her suitors.
She will live the rest of her long, slow life alone in her memories.
He sits alone with the small knife in his hand.
He sharpened it very carefully.
They call him "faggot" and "pansy".
They beat him after school.
They steal his books and paint on his locker.
He makes a cut on his arm
Fresh and pink next to the healing, older lines.
It doesn’t really hurt that much, he thinks.
He watches his pain leak out
As a dark red liquid.
It’s really kind of pretty, he thinks.
When the bleeding stops,
He is calmer—not happy, but no longer in anguish.
He stands up
And picks out a long-sleeved shirt to wear tomorrow.
Fourteen years old
Skinny
Single
Unpopular, at least in her eyes.
All she wants is
a boyfriend,
to be admired,
to be part of the "in crowd"…
All those things that suddenly seem vital in high school.
But she remains
Skinny
Single
Unpopular
Anorexia Nervosa
An insistent ache
Gnaws at her stomach
From weeks of starvation
And meals that would leave a mouse unsatisfied.
It makes her proud, that ache
Proud of her strength and determination.
Soon, she tells herself,
I will be thin.
I look for love,
Searching for it every time I meet a man.
While I pretend not to notice
The love I already feel
For a woman.
© 1999 almorey@thwy.net
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