CAPITALISM

Married three years

we planned the day.

When we would have a child,

With whom to play.

Days passed, then months and

time went so fast.

The doctors unsure,

whether or not she would last.

Her birth was traumatic.

she died twice that day.

They shocked her heart,

so she would not go away.

They placed her in NICU, (pronunciation: NI, coo)

so weak and so small.

Then gave me a bill

and a collector to call.

A RIDICULOUS AMOUNT!!!

The bill which I incurred.

When I glanced at IT,

my vision was blurred.

I told the collection office

that day…

This bill is extravagant,

I cannot pay.

A plan we devised

the collector and I.

To pay off the debt,

OH, my what a surprise.

The years passed by

and the payments were made.

The checks were sent in,

the schedule was stayed.

The day FINALLY came,

the last check sent in.

I said to my husband, “Let’s have one more.”

And he said to me, “Are you Crazy?”

 

---

Revision Account

 

Married three years…was the way I thought I wanted to begin my poem to tell about the way we started our family. I wanted to incorporate the birth of my oldest daughter and the tragedy of having a premature baby. As I began the poem, I thought this is very emotional and sentimental. I wondered if everyone in the class would think that I was just another mushy mother who was troubled by having a traumatic birth and thought this would be a way to write my feelings out in a therapeutic way. Yet, I continued writing. I found that writing in free verse would be the easiest way to express my thoughts. Here is the first draft of my poem.

Married three years

We planned the day

When we would have

A child with which to play.

Days passed then months

And time went so fast

The doctor she said she must come out

Otherwise she will not last.

Well, she died twice that day

So they shocked her heart

God gave her back with a promise

That we would raise her in Him.

She grew to be one

And a sister she had

To love and enjoy

And never know life without.

Never knowing life with out the other

They grew in the Lord

And loved

One another.

What memories they have together

As one

Yet today they are teens

And standing alone…

Well as you can see this poem written in free verse just was not going the way I wanted it to go. I shared with my husband the assignment. I told him I wanted to write a poem to express my feelings for our children. I shared with my husband the first draft of the poem. He explained to me that sometimes you can get more across with humor than you can with all the sentimentality. So with his help I began the revision process. As you can imagine having a premature baby was very emotionally taxing as well as quite a hit to the pocket book. My husband and I thought we would include the incredible expenses of having a baby born prematurely in the poem. Here is the revision of the poem.

CAPITALISM

And he said to me, “Are you Crazy?”

I share the revised poem with my classmate, Sheila Rhodes, these were her thoughts:

Be sure to correlate your stanzas so that the reader can grasp a good meaning of the poem. There is not a lot that I would change but, punctuation helps out a lot. The poem is light and humorous, although it touches on a serious matter. The alliteration is well defined in the first stanza and helps to set the tone of the poem. Very good and mindful in the area of taking something serious and finding the humor in life’s most detrimental situations. I truly appreciated Sheila’s thoughts. We talked about a few of the words and how to arrange the stanzas to make the poem flow this way. THANKS SHEILA! I also shared the poem with classmate Ron Burton. His comments were similar to Sheila’s and he got quite a chuckle upon reading it. At that point I took their thoughts and penned down how I was going to arrange the stanzas. I made a few changed in the wording and came up with the revised poem. I really enjoyed writing this poem and almost wished I could have had the entire classes thoughts on the poem. I will be very interested in your thoughts Dr. White. Thanks for the opportunity to unlock the vessel that is within each of us for writing.