Thread: For Christopher

Hello wonderful poets,

I am working on a portfolio for admission into the creative writing tract for my major, and I was hoping to get some feedback on this poem I'm looking to include. I feel confident with all my other entries but I'm not sure how this one will be received. And critiques would be most helpful.

Thanks!

He remembers being raised on a farm –
damp, secluded and open among the Indiana backwoods,
in a town not mapped
with a name no one remembers. He remembers
the swing set that sat just past the pig stock,
a ways from the house and close to the moss covered wall
that surrounded the land. Sometimes,
when he was too young to swing alone, he would watch his brother
sway up and down, back and forth, flying from the ground
as if he were a leaf, light and soft,
at the mercy of the wind.
He never made any sounds as he watched – he sat in the sand,
cross legged and still, and marveled
at the top of his brother’s head one second,
and the bottom of his shoes the next.

Sometime later, after his brother
had passed from the moss covered wall,
he grew big enough to swing by himself.
He enjoyed the brief pause in motion
as he reached the crescendo
and proceeded to fall forward.
It was that pause he remembers most –
high in the air and silent
and he could hear his brother,
somewhere close by,
whispering words that really didn’t matter.

This is very good. The underlined part is the only line that struck me as off, and I couldn't tell for sure if it was speaking of the town's name that couldn't be remembered, or if it meant the boys name that couldn't be remembered. My mind kept wanting to change it to 'with a name anyone remembers' if it's the town. Now, it could be just me who was confused at that line.

Other than that one line, I thought the flow was wonderful and the images very clear for me. Very nice.