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No Cut-Throat Rose, by Kerry O’Connor

12/21/2017

6 Comments

 
Picture
Woman with Long Hair, photography by Man Ray (USA). 1929.
No Cut-Throat Rose

This love is no rose
throat cut
bleeding sap from severed stem
and every thorn peeled away.

This love brooks no sentiment
but dark humour
collusion
a symbiosis of intelligent lust
to aid in decomposition.

This love is not written
on the moon
reeking of rhymed verse
and objectification.

This love stifles every word
that tries to speak itself
into being
no need to justify the intimate
pulse, the hungry lips.

This love is neither
truth nor
falsity, no illusory song
for fools to dance to.

I give you this love
as a stranger might hand
a dying man
a drink of water at his place
of execution. A matter of instinct.

Kerry O’Connor
​

Kerry O’Connor is the Creative Manager of a communal blog, imaginary garden with real toads, a group project which provides a forum for on-line poets. Her poetry is to be found on the Skylover blogsite, and several pieces have appeared in the online publications:  Nice Cage, Verse Wrights and Visual Verse. During working hours, Kerry is to be found in a South African high school, teaching English as a first and second language. 

6 Comments
garth
12/21/2017 02:18:39 pm

I love this poem, thank you.

Reply
Kerry link
12/22/2017 12:30:54 am

Many thanks for reading my piece. I'm pleased to know you found something in it.

Reply
Garth
12/22/2017 04:39:01 am

I also fell in love with your blog! Now I need to put my time in before applying to become a toad... :-)

Reply
Kerry link
12/22/2017 04:13:11 pm

Everyone is welcome to join in. We love to have new voices to add to our group. It's a very friendly place to hang out, with plenty of meaningful feedback.

Ω link
12/23/2017 03:13:56 pm

The last stanza ... whew, Kerry; that is strong! I love how the meaning shifts with each new line.

Reply
Brendan link
12/25/2017 06:40:15 am

I'd say Miranda has learned a few things from Caliban. That love ain't no rock n roll show. That the heart is deeper than rhyme (yikes) and wider than what we see. And to get there we have to travel with poems like these--to those places where a stranger hands the accused a glass a water on the gallows. Heart, love, those are the forward looking faces of something darker and deeper. Keep looking.

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