The Dirge of Lenore St. Laurent

I go alone then, underground
When the night murmurs without a sound
Like a dying moth smothered beneath a jar
I go alone, beneath the ground
Away from the painted clowns and tinsel gowns
Where the blinking Ferris wheels go round
In the carnival above the ground.

He paces back and forth along the stair
Fingers running through his thinning hair

But what happens when Orpheus never appears?
Do I stay, do I wait? Do I listen for a voice --
For the stillborn confession lodged in his throat?
I confess, I fail to understand his fears.

He paces back and forth along the stair
Fingers running through his thinning hair

Still, I am no Eurydice
And he is neither Lazarus nor Hamlet
But Ophelia -- a rippled face below the water
They are not mermaids but ravens
The shelled carcasses (picked clean) drift across the ocean floor;
I stand alone by the jagged shore
As the voices gurgle, "Nevermore."
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[edit // 06.07.08]

There are a couple reasons why this poem has a deeper personal meaning to me, which I didn't want to share with my English class.

- Last year, I wrote mainly vignettes. This year, I have been writing mainly poetry, but before, I had zero confidence with poetry. I think this is the first poem I actually feel proud of.

- When I was reading "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," I don't know about everyone else, but immediately I started wondering about the object of Prufrock's affections. Did she know he was in love with her? Did she love him as well? If so, how did she feel, constantly waiting for him to make the first move, as conventions dictated?

This nameless woman instantly struck a chord with my own self. I will probably never know how the Orpheus of my story sees me, but I know all too well how it feels being the one with unanswerable questions. In a way, I transferred myself into the character of Lenore St. Laurent.

- Like Prufrock, I calculate risks so carefully that I usually end up sitting passively on the sidelines. Similarly (and just as pathetically), I fear I will end up exactly like Prufrock - middle-aged and trapped in unending strings of one-sided loves.

Anyway, I am thrilled that a bunch of people actually like this poem. I really am. When I got no response during my discussion, I completely panicked, because I thought my tendency to write obscurely had gone too far. And I am also really glad that I managed to give a decent analysis of the poem in front of the class. Despite those 8's and the one 9 I've received this year, this is probably the most personal (and most satisfying) one out of the bunch.