Thursday, April 8, 2021

PAD Challenge Day 8: Remembering a Friend

 Today's prompts from Robert Lee Brewer and Maureen Thorson: (1) Write a metaphor poem, and (2) read some of the poems from Edgar Lee Masters' Spoon River Anthology and write a similar persona poem, a monologue of someone deceased. This one took me to a memory of a friend in college I was just getting to know when she died tragically in a car accident at 19, just about fifty years ago. She was a sweet, upbeat, artistically talented person, and who knows what she would have become if she hadn't been taken from us so soon. It was my first experience with the death of a friend, and it affected me deeply. 

Laurie
(after Edgar Lee Masters)
 
Returning from New York that night
we were so full of promise,
we young artists and our teacher,
when our van crashed on the turnpike,
and everything changed in a second.
Some of you were badly hurt,
but it was too much for my fragile frame.
I am sorry, friends, to take such an early exit -
I hope I brought joy in my short time there.
Fifty years on, I see most of you
have led good lives, and that pleases me.
You've navigated the highway well,
that treacherous stretch of road
that can flip us at any moment.

13 comments:

Elizabeth Boquet said...

Such loss is hard to fathom with words -- but you managed somehow. Not sure whether to say "Congrats" or "Sorry"...

Aashish said...

Such a beautiful elegy.

UleyChris said...

A moving tribute with a clever resolution. Well done.

Unknown said...

So moving when love and compassion so powerfully flow from just a few words!

Kristin said...

I remember my uncle saying we don't know what we miss by dying young after the hard deaths of him mother and wife following long debilitating illnesses. I try to remember that, but it's hard.

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Unknown said...

Thank you for this tender poem. I was touched

Vince Gotera said...

Wow. So beautiful. Thank you. And congratulations on your NaPoWriMo participant of the day selection.

ARHuelsenbeck said...

You brought tears to my eyes.

Margot Suydam said...

The simplicity of language in this poem gives it such poignancy. Beautiful!

Bruce Niedt said...

Thanks one and all for reading. I'm honored to be selected by NaPoWriMo for today, especially for such a personal poem. I feel it honors my friend as well. I'd like to think she's smiling at me now.

Jenna said...

Beautiful <3

Kate said...

Incredibly written!

Unknown said...

Eloquently expressed. No fear or anger, just acknowledgement of the loss. It reminds me that those who pass are at peace. We who are left are the ones that grieve.