TheFifthElement

Sitting at the front
on the top deck
of a number 7 bus,
waiting on a red light,

a young girl
turns
suddenly, drops her ticket
to the floor

without discernable cause;
the bus purrs;
a satisfied cat slinks

between the cars -
its body is a tight spring,
pressed low against the ground
as though smallness
might equate to safety -

to the other side of the road;
swallowed
by a hungry bush
fat on summer, bulging
into a battered old fence;
slivers of dried white paint
crumble to the ground,

leaves follow; waxy curls
bent into a smile
like a bus ticket, abandoned
on the top deck
at the front
of a number 7 bus:

a young girl
waits
for a green light.

Homemaster

I felt this was a different poem, for me at least. I enjoyed some of the imagery and generally the progression was good.

I'm no expert, but at times I felt it didn't flow as well as it could. Here are some examples:

a young girl
turns
suddenly, drops her ticket
to the floor
without discernable cause;

the bus purrs;
a satisfied cat slinks
between the cars -

its body is a tight spring,
pressed low against the ground
as though smallness
might equate to safety -

I really liked the imagery after this and then how it returned to how it began but in a different way. I think the term I'm looking for is an almost panoramic view of this scene. The more I think about it, the more I like it!

I'm sure more experienced people will have more to say, but the second half was great!

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Green - Change
Blue - My suggestion
Red - Destroy

Baron

You need to give some serious thought to the line breaks in this poem. There seems no point to many of them, they seem random, and do nothing to help the flow or the effect of the poem.

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ShabookiSkittles

The poem is good in itself but the stanzas seem so randomly spaced out. it almost seems like you are cutting a thought in half part way through. My only suggestion would be with "to the other side of the road;" Perhaps replace it with "on the other side of the road;"? the lines around it just make the line sound a bit out of place in it's current form.

Jon1jt

The first thing that jumped out at me was the title of the piece. It's too vague. Every poem, in some sense, is a still life portrait. There seems to be 'something' going on beyond description. Maybe not. The 'young girl' seems superfluous because you could equally substitute a first person or "people" or passengers and it wouldn't make a hoot of difference. You bring it back to the girl, which works, but why she gets more attention than the leaves I couldn't say. My interpretation is the girl is part of the landscape, part of the still life. I dunno.

The bus 'purrs'?? More like a guttural cough (I used to live next to a bus stop)
But it's England and I've never been there so I'll take your word for it.

I like what you have up until here, the transition is awkward, aesthetically.


a hungry bush?

a bush
fat on summer

works fine.

I liked the visual of the cat like a spring and the line about smallness equating to safety. I was a bit confused though as far as figuring out what that means as it pertains to the cat and its smallness (?) Seems random.

Anyway, thank you for this bus ride on the #7. Quite a view from that top deck.

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"He was nauseous with regret when he saw her face again, and when, as of yore, he pleaded and begged at her knees for the joy of her being. She understood Neal; she stroked his hair; she knew he was mad."
---Jack Kerouac, On The Road: The Original Scroll

GridCanal

The rythem is jumpy and erratic, but I guess you have your own style of free verse poetry, and I respect that.

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