Join the Neopoet online poetry workshop and community to improve as a writer, meet fellow poets, and showcase your work. Sign up, submit your poetry, and get started.

Protected Every Smile of the Way

When the inevitable midnight hour greets me
slapping my sullen face
with the sudden rudeness of a winter rain,

I won't complain at all, this time.
Let those raindrops fall to balance me,
that I may remember the laughter of the dawn;

and when that rain has gone away,
I'd even pray for the hottest, highest noon
to slap and anger the skin I wear!

I promise you, I won't even care then, either!
For if my skin would truly turn to leather,
I shan't forget the midnight hour's grin;

because I rather thrive for each giggle in the breeze.
These extremes are constantly snickering at me!
The last laugh is mine, though. For I'm forever protected by your smile.

Style / type: 
Free verse
Review Request (Intensity): 
I want the raw truth, feel free to knock me on my back
Review Request (Direction): 
How does this theme appeal to you?
How was the beginning/ending of the poem?
Is the internal logic consistent?
Last few words: 
Another "shot" @ a freeform poem.
Editing stage: 

Comments

I'm betting I read more into this than you intended. The last line, of course, gives the poem the character of a love poem to a lover. Without that last line I see it as a plea to God (whatever He may be) on the lines of Job.
I gotta adjust my medication.
wesley

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

...there's nothing wrong with your medication. You can just about read most love poems and mean them to God, or a Savior like Jesus; just look @ the Psalms of David.
Having shared that, this is one of those. Thanx for reading, my friend.
Sincerely,
doc.

Neopoet is "newtriffic" !
...from the heart, or a reasonable faxcimile;
david a. goodwin #{:>{)} @==

author comment

...other than content, (which seems to irrevocably, and convincingly suspect, @ best); how is my "free-verse" coming along? I really don't FEEL the poetry without the rhyme....ya know?
I should maybe Google it,
doc.
doc.

Neopoet is "newtriffic" !
...from the heart, or a reasonable faxcimile;
david a. goodwin #{:>{)} @==

author comment

Been there, done that. It will only give you endless examples and light weight discussions about meter that we already understand.
Alas.
In fear of sounding defeatist, I will say that "your" free verse is a hell of a lot better than mine (being virtually non existent).
As I work through my experiments in form (lately- "The Ode" and Triolet), so called "free verse" mutters and mumbles at me.
If I have a suggestion to make it is small and this... be wary of enjambment when you don't sport a rhyme at the end of a line. Wandering from one line to another in free verse I think tends toward the paragraph and therefore prose.
I'm certainly not the one to ask, but there it is.
I suspect (oddly because of my attitude toward free verse) that METER is far more critically important than when you have rhyme to aid in the separation of lines and thoughts.
wesley

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

understandably clear and consice thinking, and an agreeable argument! By jove, I think I've got it!
doc.

Neopoet is "newtriffic" !
...from the heart, or a reasonable faxcimile;
david a. goodwin #{:>{)} @==

author comment

...just thought I'd add that I really do appreciate your "take" on just about EVERYTHING that I whine about. Sorry to put you in the way of my digestion of thought, and reason; sorry 'bout that.
take care, my good friend;
sincerely,
doc.

Neopoet is "newtriffic" !
...from the heart, or a reasonable faxcimile;
david a. goodwin #{:>{)} @==

author comment

If I can get you to bark up a different tree or louder at the one you're beneath, then I believe I have given what I desire poets to give me. Like FDR said (and of course I paraphrase) "Say something. It may be wrong, but for god's sake say something." If I whine about ten things, one might be worthwhile. You have twenty poets do that and you have twenty improvements. Before you know it you've grown. wesley

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

(c) Neopoet.com. No copyright is claimed by Neopoet to original member content.