Ela

by Melpomene   Sep 8, 2013


Your mother has been worried
about the exit wounds on your shoulders.
She calls and calls ("ela, ela"),
but I can't come.

I promised myself I wouldn't
write about you anymore,
that I had been writing myself
skinless for the wrong person

but you, you birthed my first
real love poem, about lanterns and
naked flames and when I wrote
about Paris you slept restlessly
beside me, sheets sticky with a
summer sweat and it was
you who made Paris seem grand.

I used to follow you into sleepless
nights, tiled floors and those
hours waiting for you to come
home, to where?

I still don't know.

I watched you put barriers
between us, so I had to
put reefs between us, capital
cities, seas and screams
between us,

I'd call and call ("ela ela")
but you'd not come.

Your mother has been worried
about the exit wounds left on our
shoulders.

She calls and calls
but we can't go.

ela = come in Greek.

6


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Latest Comments

  • 11 years ago

    by Redangelwings

    I love how you used the title here. It is so well written and inside I feel so many emotions. I love all the details about the love you have for this person. You say they are your first love poem and that is very lovely. I feel like you are saying you dont like being anywhere without this person. The details are so well written here that the you suck the reader into the poem. We all can feel like we are there.

    You dont know where your true home lies and you don't know if you love this person. Are they your real home? That's what leaves the reader guessing I think. You and this person seem to be falling apart and there is war going on inside you. The tone is very strong indeed. You leave so many things for the reader to think about.

    I love the ending too. You make the point there. You had to get away from this person so thats why Paris is written. I love the under tones there. People say Paris is a romantic city but this person feels so alone. Everyone is worried but you just want to be alone here. I love everything about this. 5/5

  • 11 years ago

    by Chelsey

    Mel, I have tears in my eyes and goosebumps on my arms after reading this. By far, one of your greatest poems. Please never delete this, and if you do send me a copy. I saved it in my faves but often times poets delete their accounts then i never see it again.

    The parts about Paris, the parts about what you had to put between you....amazing stanzas, amazing wording, amazing tone...just Incredibly flawless..

    I have not felt this strongly, so in Love with a poem in such a long time.

    The heartbreak here, the loss, the melodic rhythm this carries, it really makes the reader feel like they already know the story, without even knowing.

    I'd be damn proud of this write Mel. I am for you. I find you took one word, Greek at that, and made it totally captivating.

    Incredible.

  • 11 years ago

    by Yakari Gabriel

    <3 must

  • 11 years ago

    by Meme

    I am in freakin' love with this poem!! One of the best I have ever read in this site. It is raw and moving and perfect and beyond anything I read in a long looooong while.

    You have penned an image that will haunt anyone who comes to read this piece.

    Epic
    xoxo

  • 11 years ago

    by Abed

    This is incredibly magnificently moving and vivid and... ugh... I can't express it well.. It tastes like those extravagantly sad French movies.

    Perfecto!

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