Poem of the Week
How I Died Before I Was Born
*from 2004... i had a dream when i was young. it has stuck with me ever since so i decided to finally write about it. it's not the typical type of poem i would write. i never knew what to do with it, so i've published it here.*
I'm certain it was Vietnam.
I was shot in the back multiple times.
I fell into poison ivy, bleeding.
Someone told me that there's
no poison ivy in the Vietnam jungle,
but my skin was certainly irritated
moreso than the bullet holes
draining my blood
onto the thick earth
of the jungle floor.
I was born a year later
in Indiana
where snow falls and leaves
are stripped from the trees
and creates skeletons from
stinging nettles
and cracks the skin until it bleeds
in an eczema party.
How can I explain?
I know what it's like to be shot
from behind, multiple times
and being left for dead.
And when I turned my back and
walked away from you,
I squinted my eyes in preparation.
I still have trouble breathing sometimes.
- Monday, October 02, 2006 poem of the week archives