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Sunday, April 06, 2014

In a single gal's shoes

Walk in a single gal’s shoes to
see how she tries to keep
at bay, the ideas your
kind throws at her about marriage.

For she’s brimming
with a sense of freedom, with
a sense of being in love
with herself, which in
her eyes is the
only sincere loving.

However try, if you must, with a cup
of coffee, whenever
you see that you’re
the only one she’s got. Wrong
or right, who cares, but let’s admit,
if anything cheers her up, it
has got to be coffee and whenever
she is her bright self with you, you’re
sure to know you’ve got it all right.

Get her the wrong way, and see her go “shut
the fuck up!




Written for National Poetry Writing Month. 30 poems in 30 days. Today's prompt is  to write a “golden shovel.” This form was invented by Terrance Hayes in his poem, The Golden Shovel. The last word of each line of Hayes’ poem is a word from Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem We Real Cool.

I chose A Word to Husbands by Ogden Nash:

To keep your marriage brimming
With love in the loving cup,
Whenever you’re wrong, admit it;
Whenever you’re right, shut up.


More shoveling happening here:

http://jaibalarao.com/   - Jaibala

5 comments:

  1. This is so you. Good one Naina.

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  2. Oh my God Naina, this is truly superb!

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  3. Excellent use of the golden shovel! You worked in the poem brilliantly.

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  4. Janaki said it. BTW love your blog title.

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  5. :) Nice choice of reference poem & I like what has developed from it.

    But like I suggested to Jaibala, don't bold the end words. Knowing what's the form, your readers will start reading the reference poem first. That'll not give your poem the attention it merits :)

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