This Poem was Submitted By: Joanne M Uppendahl On Date: 2016-06-23 18:09:29 . . . Click Here To Mail this Poem to a Friend!

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Feathers

It was Sunday when I walked past my husband's empty bedroom  He was in the hospital again. I realized he wasn't ever coming home and my losing the burden  of caring for him had become  a lost blessing sending me into deep grief as if my trust in the goodness of life was gone and nobody had told me about the black hole, the vortex of pain I'd fall into  like the red-winged blackbird  my grandfather shot, whose wing he'd stretched out, admiring the once-brave feathers as I watched.

Copyright © June 2016 Joanne M Uppendahl


This Poem was Critiqued By: DeniMari Z. On Date: 2016-07-05 22:28:08
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 10.00000
What a beautiful poem on loss Joanne; I take heart to your words having suffered through many deaths in my family - Grief and I are not strangers - the pain goes beyond words but to write them as poetically as you have - is the process toward healing - if healing to be whole again comes - personally I believe it can't fully heal for the depth of the love so deep and the selfless act of care giving comes back in memories - It's a life changing event - and this sadness can surface out of the blue - and pull you back in to it - yet you have found a way to equate this to an event as your subtle lines tap in to that black hole - an analogy so well said - it made my heart skip a beat - My sincerest sentiments to you - and may you progress with healing - and continue writing - this is sad but inspirational at the same time. Blessings, Deni


This Poem was Critiqued By: Mark Steven Scheffer On Date: 2016-06-24 14:41:48
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 1.00000
JU, Poignant. Good to have you back. Regina was here last month. Sort of like a family reunion in the days before machine locomotion - arrivals spread out over months as people ride up in the dust from all over the world. MSS
This Poem was Critiqued By: Tony P Spicuglia On Date: 2016-06-24 10:35:16
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 10.00000
Joanne, I held my breath seeing your verse, remembering when it was the norm, and a particularly prized norm at that. I wondered, as the song says, “where have all the flowers gone.” I always hope for a new garden each year, and have become adept at coaxing a response from the soil. And then the subject; I understand it all. Being a full time caregiver or (giving my best strength to the extending of another’s quality of life), is the “burden of living... blessing.” Reading your words caused me to reach for your heart, that is as your heart is. I understand the heart and the travail. I read and reread your S3-4 many times (leaving the blackbird for another moment). I wonder what I’d be able to write from the chasm, from the loss and gain, the truly defined paradox, where sacramental and indiscretion might vie for ascendency. There are many red-winged blackbirds where I live and work. The last stanza, of the death, if you will, of the innocent, being admired by the guilty, is analogical; and I wonder how much of the analogy is of the griever, or simply emotional tied to the paradox. I know you, and the loss of the blackbird would have made a great impression on you. With regard to the loss of one central to your everyday regard- the two are not so dissimilar. However; one is a non-binding event, while the other will forever be the binding response. The paradox within, attempts to tie the two into a single loss or accusation. The heart must not allow the conflagration. A wonderful piece, about a very vexing moment of life. Thank you for your words, again. By the way, beauty remains what it is. Even a can of paint thrown against the Mona Lisa, cannot mar, what the Mona Lisa is. Beauty finds its own way.
This Poem was Critiqued By: Joe Gustin On Date: 2016-06-23 20:08:53
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 10.00000
This poem takes loss to a whole new level or should I say depth. Where the burden, now gone has become the blessing is indeed a cruel strike at the heart. The passage about the bird shot sinks so quickly into the heart of any reader who has experienced the vortex of pain. So beautifully written.
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