Thread: Sharps Container

Sharps Container

We used to play hopscotch
on anesthetized sidewalks
to get those tingles through our toes,
and that was just the first practice.
We sutured our hands to the same square,
stroked all the pieces we said would be

in pieces.

That was our genius.
We would lay where we played,
untangle,
and open our eyes.

I'm a bit slow on the uptake, and I hope I don't offend, but are you a surgeon?

Anyway, good stuff. I don't have the faintest clue what it means except there's some "echo of childhood" stuff going on. The last three lines were my favorite.

For me, this went from feeling like many people were involved (I envision at least four kids when I think of hopscotch even though I know it's incorrect) to just two, the narrator and the reader...

Okay, the above blather was useless.

Most confusing/deep/profound lines:

We sutured our hands to the same square,
stroked all the pieces we said would be

in pieces.

My theory is that since "in pieces" means "broken," you intended this to be "we connected via these games of hopscotch; we stroked the pieces (of our lives) we knew would eventually be broken/separated"...

Most definitely not a surgeon. I'm studying to become a dentist, perhaps even an oral surgeon someday, but not even close at the moment. This piece is difficult to explain in my current state, but I will come back later. Thank you so much for your input.

Angel, this one was difficult for me to understand. Though, I see you're giving yourself a reprieve from the father topic. Writing about children playing I think is out of your comfort zone and commend you for braving a different, lighter topic. I would suggest writing a brief "narrative" about a subject. Just a story. I think it would ground you. Then fool around with it eliminating the unesessary and incorporating the important and then do your wonderful figure of speach thing.

Angel, may I play with it a bit in order to make you look from a different angle. You are of course at liberty to ignore everything I say.

Conjunctions and linking words can reduce the impact of the poem, and this poem to me has great potential. Conjunctions can make a poem sound explainatory rather than something which stands on its own. I have removed the line which got between the tactile nature of the original lines 3 and 5 and, by changing the to that have particularised the square to which you sutured your hands, so that is no longer any old square, but a particular one. Next, what to do about a pair of pieces - does using pieces for the second time in two lines really work, or is it weak? If you said it was going to be in pieces then it is no surprise to know that it is in pieces, because you are already stroking those pieces. Now, removing the line about practising may in your view cripple your meaning, which may indicate that I just don't get it, but as you don't imply what it is you are practising, or what for, I wondered whether the line actually misled us rather than showing us.

We used to play hopscotch
on anesthetized sidewalks
get those tingles through our toes,
suture our hands to that same square,
stroked all the pieces we said would be

in pieces.

That was our genius.
We would lie where we played,
untangle,
open our eyes.

If you step on a nick
You'll marry a stick
And a black jack will come to your wedding.

And did you ever play that game where two people stood with a circle of elastic round them, and a third person jumped in and out making patterns (almost like a cats cradle). There was some untangling in that for sure.