By the end of October, we've finished reading The Picture of Dorian Gray, and the class is bracing themselves for a 700 word book report assignment. We are surprised when Ms. Blanchett says she wants us to write a poem about the book instead.
"I don't want you to write a hogwash paper about what this book is about," she says, walking up and down the aisles and handing us small stacks of the assignment to pass around. "I want you to write, in a poem of any length, it could be a haiku, a sonnet, whatever--what this book means to you. Who is Dorian Gray to you? What feelings does he evoke?"
I leave school in the middle of the day to write my poem. There is a small meadow that the forest opens up to a couple minutes' drive from school. No one has ever been in it, it seems, except for me.
I drive into the meadow, stop my car, then sit up on the roof and begin to write.
The real Narcissus could not
Have been as perfect as she
The curves of her hips
Rewrite history, she is made of ivory and gold.
Her alabaster skin
Mocks the hue of the moon
She laughs like God and smiles
Like she holds the soul of the world
In her hand
If you were unfortunate enough
To meet her
Your soul would never find peace again
You would see her in the sky
And your heart will drown in her voice
Everything she touched
was stained by her fingertips
As if all the purity in the world
Were given to her at a stroke
A toss of her hair was all it took
The world belonged to her
She stood like Aphrodite
Danced like a beautiful storm
You were chained to the way she moved
Until you knew only her beauty
Unaware of yours
If the people knew her secret
Would they have loved her so?
Would they have revered her golden hair
And envied her red lips
And worshipped her eyes like comets?
Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic.
YOU ARE READING
Only You
FanfictionImagine going on a road trip with Cate, escaping reality, lost in adventure...how would it feel? (Kind of an X Reader but with an OC, I made it as easy as I could to self-insert)
