ONCE YOU’RE A FAILURE

 

Once you’re

a failure

all expectations

are dropped

 

everybody

just up

and gives up on you

and you’re left

down there in

a deep hole

 

seems the more

you climb

to get out

 

the deeper it is

you get

stuck in that hole

 

the crowds, they

all go home,

the parades and speeches

are canceled;

the banners

proclaiming your greatness

 are taken down

 

everyone

moves on

to other things

 

that are,

to them,

of greater consequence

than your failure

 

and when the spotlight

is turned off

and you’re alone

 

then can you
finally begin to shine

 

then can you

tune into the soul

and dig out the granite

pearls of infinite wisdom

 

then can you
reach the zenith

promised by millions

 

You’re there alone;

a failure

 

but there is

a light that shines

upon you

 

although it emanates

from within

 

It is that

which truly

makes you great

 

It is the integrity

of a soul

that never did

know when to quit

 

11-22-91

 

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lyrycsyntyme's picture

A standing ovation speech

A standing ovation speech wrapped in the uniquely beautiful shape of a poem.

georgeschaefer's picture

that's just one way for me to

that's just one way for me to pat myself on the back

lyrycsyntyme's picture

haha. Well, don't get your

haha. Well, don't get your skin all red and irritated, but have a blast.

S74RW4RD's picture

You have described an

You have described an experience which was inflicted upon me by my parents from the time I entered kindergarten, September, 1963.  From that time forward, my parents were very articulate about what a disappointment to them I had become, or was becoming, or would most certainly becoming (depending on what part of my life they were discussing).  My paternal grandparents, the only grandparents I really knew, were entirely aghast at this.  However, I took great comfort in an article I read in Life magazine in June, 1968, an article celebrating and explicating the conception and composition of Mary Shelley's first novel, Frankenstein, in 1818.  Mary's mother died of sepsis shortly after giving her birth.  For the rest of his life, Mary's father reminded her that she had killed her mother, and that she would never be the sort of intellectual writer her mother was.  (I think Mary was far greater.)  The writer of the Life article suggested---and I agree with him---that Frankenstein is primarily motivated by this sense of failure that Mary felt, and that she transferred to the Monster in his long monologue which is very near the mathematical center of the novel.  This knowledge, from that article and then confirmed by my attempts to read the novel, was my first venture out from under the pressing thumbs of my parents, Lloyd and Betty.  I have been grateful to Mary Shelley since that time.

   I wish that your poem had been available to me in 1967 and 1968 when I began to understand what my parents' discouragements had done, and were still doing, to me.  And I think your poem will also serve as an encouragement to others who have been similarly afflicted---as I suspect this sort of thing still happens far more than is admitted.  In this way, your poem will have an impact on lives that is more than merely literary---in the same way that Frankenstein has had such an impact.  The great Poet, Wallace Srevens (whose work I admire without least reservation), whom I have been reading and studying since 1978, once said that the main purpose of poetry is to help people live their lives.  I believe that is true, because I believe everything Pop Stevens ever wrote, but I think that you, too----in this poem and several others that I have read recently---have accomplished that high calling here on postpoems also.  And for that, sir, you have my applause and gratitude.

   PS.  Are you familiar with Philip Larkin's poem, "This Be The Verse" ?  


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georgeschaefer's picture

sorry if I stirred unpleasant

sorry if I stirred unpleasant memories but thank you for the kind words.

S74RW4RD's picture

Thank you.  This far into my

Thank you.  This far into my allotted life soan, those memories are no longer unpleasant, as I am remindered, with each remembrance, that I was led around, or over, or through the obstruction.  


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