Thank you, Lynn and Brian. From your, my & all posts, I'm learning a lot about how we read, the mined path from resistance to embrace. This group is just great. Tom

I am intrigued, like the form and think that it feels like an exploration of indifference...
Jill

I agree to the need for a title change, but find the 'tell' aspect of this remarkable write is what makes the pain of narrator's situation real and incredibly genuine.  While the Waites attend the church of Perennial Despair, the voice of this piece lives inside a space where the despair is such that it cannot be faced.  Someone once said that a poem says what it says in a way that cannot be communicated other than as it has been.  I have seldom read about loss and felt as lost as the voice of the piece.  The minutia of the lives next door is one reality; the curiosity of the girl in the window is another -- a bridge of sorts between her world, the world of the Waites family, and his world ,where ghosts of the family that was abide. 

One of the best poems I've read here or anywhere.  I hate to be redundant but remarkable write.  Bravo, you.

lynn

Yes, that minutia of the couple next door (and style of voice/narrator) seems to really slow the "moment" of loss, (perhaps, the way an old fashioned film projector, when it breaks down, slows the action in the film ) and reader and narrator are free to look at it in a protracted way.

Tom,

This is a stunning Letter Poem. One of the best I've read.
It so reminded me of Lyn Hejinian whose work I admire very much.

I found the caps unnecessary and a few bumps in the read but you'll straighten them out, I'm sure.

I would change the title to who this is written to, though. Dear....

Maybe with an * after it, and the explanation after the last stanza.

Very, very nice.

Maggie

Came to this late and have just spent a lovely time with your words

Thanks Tom   

Sx

Thanks for interesting & kind thoughts, Maggie Jill & Stella. --Tom

Fantastic choice Mugs! Congratulations Tom! The best place for this excellent poem (still wish you'd change the damn title though ;) )

B.

Good to see this up front, Tom.

milner

I’m very happy to have been accepted into this fab commune so warmly. I would be happy to take the disclaimer off the poem's posting title, Brian, but I'm afraid if I start screwing around with it, the whole shebang will just disappear somewhere. Anyway, thanks again Maggie and all. Tom

To change it, just click the modify link at the bottom of the original post (you need to be logged in to see the link).
Just change the title in the subject bar.
Go on . . . live life on the edge Tom . . . ;)

B.

All right....here goes!

When I had the honour of being featured last week, I was so tempted to remove topic, just to see what would happen . . .  (OK, that confession has probably stopped me ever getting featured again . . .)

B.

Though I'm generally not a fan of length in poetry, I found this absolutely compelling-- from the theme of yearning to make human connections in a mechanistic social world, to the effect of the overwhelmingly short and simple lines stacked on top of one another, to the quasi-couplets at the end of each stanza. Very nice. I have nothing to offer in the way of criticism-- just, very nice.

Take care,

-O 

I'm so glad you enjoyed this, O. Thank you for posting. --Tom