Not a red rose or a satin heart.
I give you an onion.
It is a moon wrapped in brown paper.
It promises light
like the careful undressing of love.
Here.
It will blind you with tears
like a lover.
It will make your reflection
a wobbling photo of grief.
I am trying to be truthful.
Not a cute card or a kissogram.
I give you an onion.
Its fierce kiss will stay on your lips,
possessive and faithful
as we are,
for as long as we are.
Take it.
Its platinum loops shrink to a wedding-ring,
if you like.
Lethal.
Its scent will cling to your fingers,
cling to your knife.
I give you an onion.
It is a moon wrapped in brown paper.
It promises light
like the careful undressing of love.
Here.
It will blind you with tears
like a lover.
It will make your reflection
a wobbling photo of grief.
I am trying to be truthful.
Not a cute card or a kissogram.
I give you an onion.
Its fierce kiss will stay on your lips,
possessive and faithful
as we are,
for as long as we are.
Take it.
Its platinum loops shrink to a wedding-ring,
if you like.
Lethal.
Its scent will cling to your fingers,
cling to your knife.
I think it's the absurd notion of giving an onion as a lover's token that I like about this poem. Are you interested in developing an absurdist approach to your experiments?
ReplyDeleteTo be honest I hadn't really though about it. I do quite like poetry to be simple which I think the Duffy poem is but there are some cases of absurd poetry where the meaning gets lost for me. Whilst I agree that in some cases it is up to the reader to decipher a meaning, I think that you lose the essence of a poem when you're readers don't know what to make of it.
ReplyDeleteI adore this poem though!
ReplyDelete