by David Feela
Version 5.1 used rhyme
and a cadence in metrical time
to lyrically consider the death of a child.
Version 6.8 left the child dead
but revised the last stanza
to prove the mother was unwed.
The release of version 7.6
buried rhymes inside the lines
so the reader could listen, say,
to a torrent of rain against a pane of glass.
The floodwaters rose in 8.7,
the lines expanded to accommodate the flow
and the natural rhythm of speech surfaced,
forcing readers to question if poetry
had reached its last form of expression.
Confessional verse evolved by version 9.2,
where the child narrated her own catastrophe,
then died when the poem was through.
The latest version promises
to fix all the glitches,
to turn the tragedy into love
and leave the reader in stitches.
David Feela is a poet, free-lance writer, writing instructor, and book collector.. His work has appeared in regional and national publications, including the High Country News' "Writers on the Range," Mountain Gazette, and in the newspaper as a "Colorado Voice" for The Denver Post. He is a contributing editor and columnist for Inside/Outside Southwest and for The Four Corners Press. A poetry chapbook, Thought Experiments (Maverick Press), won the Southwest Poet Series. His first full length poetry book, The Home Atlas, is now available.
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