Thread: life smiles with crooked teeth

life smiles with crooked teeth
a cheshire imperfection
rips the trust
from underneath
and undermines
foundations

I love the image of the crooked teeth, but I do wonder about the connection between it and the ripping of trust. I think if you are continuing your thought on "life" when you get to the ripping part, then you would need to put some punctuation to break it apart from the first image. As of now it almost reads like the imperfection is the ripper - not life itself. That said, I love the second part of this as well. "rips the trust" is such a great line. But again - I do find some difficulty making the transition from the imperfection the the rip from underneath.

Maybe something like:

life smiles with crooked teeth -
a cheshire imperfection -
rips the trust
from underneath
and undermines
foundations

Your line breaks are solid. Great rhythm and attention to the idea. No extra words used. Again - my only nit would be the transition between the two images.

Thanks for sharing!

I agree with Squalid glass. Love the image of life smiling with crooked teeth but how does it rip trust from underneath? You could also omit "the" before trust.

A very complex thought, well written---I do agree with Squalid Glass. Peace...Jul

For me the 'cheshire imperfection' line tied together perfectly with the following. That feeling of someone smiling to you, but really you know that the person is up to something. The very smile itself rips away the trust. And the adrenaline that kicks in when something is wrong; 'from underneath' really had me feel that 'kick'.

'Life smiles with crooked teeth' is the perfect metaphor and title for this piece. It encompasses the whole thing. Though I'm not sure you need it as the first line as well...

Short, simple and brilliantly conveying an unusual yet known sentiment.

Thanks Martin, spot on.

Thank you Squalid glass. I struggled a bit with this one because crooked teeth are not necessarily a sign of something possibly amiss, hence the next line, as Martin pointed out is there to reinforce and remind us that crooked has dual meanings. Thanks for the read and your comments.

Thanks for reading and commenting Shadows and Firemajic.

To answer your question Shadows, Martin gets the idea pretty well, also crooked teeth are imperfect. Humans seek perfection, but life is not perfect, just when we think something is going well, or perfectly, life smiles and shows us its crooked teeth, our foundation of assumed perfection crumbles, and down we go.