Diary of a daughter who didn't get the part

this is wonderful maggy - very powerful

in 4. I think it is always barbed wire - unless barbwire is an americanism perhaps?

thanks! I think you could be right I've been typing all the different ways of writing it into google but that's the only one my word processor picked up. I'm going to change it back to barbed because that was my initial thought!

yes, I just googled it and it seems to be the american version. You'll have to make a cultural decision!

This is just brilliant. I love the gentle touch of fluidity with an overarching complexity. You have a special, impressive way with words and expression. These lines stood out to me:

I noticed how you wear your emotions:
like a stroke.

It is almost day, I leave
before you wake, taking in
the smiles of a holiday in Spain,
smiles that threaten to hook
their glistening teeth onto
my skin.

Very well written. Congrats on the well deserved cherries!

Jose..

thanks Jose!

I have read this twice and the second read revealed so much more than the first - I will be back to read it many more times. This is very special, maggy.

"After we watched that hospital show
I noticed how you wear your emotions:
like a stroke."

What a powerful image this is.

Yet another poem that makes me have to contemplate upon its brilliance just to try and fathom it. Your poetry sure does make the reader think hard about his/her personal outlook on life and lines like these...

"I swallow it whole, I am nobody I
know, I am fourteen years old and I have
given up, mouse-clicking towards a place where
self-destruction is encouraged."

... are proof of what I just said.

An amazing piece of writing that I could just read over and over again.

So far, having read and commented on almost all of your poetry on your profile, I definitely find this poem to be among your best.

Just amazing. Well done.

Nathan x

Another excellent piece, Maggy. You continue to dazzle me!

a fascinating poem maggy, much enjoyed.

Congratulations on the cherries.

Jenny.

thanks so much everyone!

Don't worry about the multiple posting Richard, it happened to me too last night!

Basically the poem's speaker returns home to her mother in the first stanza and leaves that home in the last. However in the others she revisits some painful memories that have occurred in that house.

I'll be sure to give your work a read!

Wow, Maggy -

taking shape beneath the sticky smell of
your tulip breath - in and out - connecting
me to you

as I lip sync the words
that were never exhaled.

&

unpeeling over kitchen tiles but it’s
okay, it’s okay, a suture of hope
holding my heart in place.

&

a Chinese burn across my skull as you
twisted my plaits like a noose

- I'm awe-struck by these lines. I don't know how you do it, but I love it when you do!

Another breath-taking read, many congrats on the cherry :)

Rachel xx

thanks for your lovely comment Rachel!

"I've been typing all the different ways of writing it into google but..." And I thought I was the only person who checked spelling this way.

On a more serious note, this is another gem of a poem. What can I say that hasn't already been mentioned above. I especially love the prosey quality - you're not just writing some flowerly rhetoric but getting at the true essence of things.

thanks Barry! hahaha glad I'm not the only one who treats Google like some wise oracle

So many good lines. Great poem Maggy- yet again. Love the metaphor about the tulips!
;)Pia

It's all been said, maggy. A masterpiece of a poem;-)

Tina

new Maggyyvaneijk
Congrats; on cherry!
the images and words expressing
this excellent,
I like stanza 4
The worst days were spent alone in my room,
the anemone-glow of a inflicted wound
my voice trapped beneath my tongue, a cry
caught a barbed wire mouth, then suddenly
a shuffle under my door,paper folded tight
yes, computer sluggish, repeats four times.
I can identify myself in quite a bit of this
I read re;read can you say where can get books titles Please of "The Poison Bible"by Barbara Kingsolver" and "Unhappy Marriages to.
julie xx "

So rewarding to read Maggie! I feel like I should be paying for stuff this good! and I would, gladly.

thank you so much, that's too nice

so sorry i'm so late. Your poem left me speechless. It's amazing Maggie, it really is. :-)

Beeme xx

Too many beautiful images to mention, Maggy. Though the sea-anenome wound may be my favourite! Very well done on the cherry :)

Magic xxx

Maggy,

Let’s not talk about this beautiful poem-of-the-week. Rather let’s talk about the Atlantic Monthly magazine from the late nineteen sixties. Each month the editors published two or three poems and, if the reader was lucky, one might be a real gem. Or maybe none would be any good, because they were written by really, really, really, really famous American poets who had long since forgotten how to write anything of artistic merit.

But every great once in a while (i.e. even more rarely as the decades wound down to the millennium) you might trip over a sparkling gem of a poem and that would make the effort of reading through the rest worthwhile. Your poem, “Diary of a Daughter who didn’t get the Part” is the rare find that the serious reader thumbing through back issues of the Atlantic or the New Yorker hoped against hope to find.

I think like shoe Maggy, it's a bit like Spotify I'm not sure why it's free. More brilliance. :-)