Lily

[indar]

I was taken with AF's tribute to her mother-in-law in her poem Greens on Rice. I dredged up one I wrote about my mother-in-law in 2017:

Lily
 
The second or third day of rain
my mother-in-law might
take down her guitar,
big factory hands,

settle on haunches
that claimed
a whole chair and more. Strum,
turn pegs and strum,
in a 2-packs-a-day voice
sing the sad, dustbowl
words she learned from the radio:

Can I sleep in Your Barn
Tonight Mister?; Old Shep;
Knoxville Girl. It's not
the songs that tighten
my throat, remembering,
but my disregard for the singer.

Always, there's the guilt of
the living and the unchanging look
in her eyes I recall like an old photo
stuck on the wall
that no amount of regret
can turn away.

[Interlace1]

Really, really like this. 

totally empathise with the sentiments and I think you capture the nature of this particular genre of regret/guilt perfectly. 
One or two nits: do you mean backwards? If so, could you change it to back country? It’s less obviously demeaning and more evocative of the rustic musical tradition you are trying to evoke. 

are the song words you quote actually lyrics or are they song titles? I think they should all be lyrics, preferably, and preferably ones that nod to the theme of the poem. 

in the last verse, would you improve it by cutting ‘guilt of the’? You would be left with the same idea but expressed more subtlety and without the told abstraction - ‘guilt’

best,


luke 
 

[indar]

Thank you Luke , for the thoughtful comments. I am trying "dustbowl" in exchange for back woods as I believe most of the things she sang were from her early life but they were also "hills" type songs. I see you've written backwards but it appears "back woods which is different in connotation (Elvis covered Old Shep many years later and some other things she sang were included in the movie Oh Brother where Art Thou ) Red Foley - Old Shep - YouTube

Charlie Poole-Can I Sleep In Your Barn Tonight Mister - YouTube

I don't know how I could work the actual lyrics into the poem--perhaps a more adept writer could. And maybe it takes a musicologist to "hear" them in this context.

That last item: "guilt of the living" was added because of some confusion among readers relating to her status--is she alive or deceased? I'll consider it --I do drag old poems around with me for years and fiddle with them occasionally. Again, thanks

 

[Matty11]

-I do drag old poems around with me for years and fiddle with them occasionally.

Ditto. Pleased, you did share, particularly enjoyed the set-up in S1 and S2. Readers will connect to the sentiments in S3 and S4. All very real.

Good one Linda.

Phil

[Mark]

Thoughtful writing with some great phrasing and imagery that create a palpable mood and tone.