Fly

[Donald Q.]

Fly


Poor fly – very small, a fruit fly –  These two statements don't lock together in tone, the first is a more formal start, then the second is more conversational.. maybe 'a poor fly, a very small fruit fly' or something...
floated 'round my bathroom five days if not a week. why use 'round?  also 'five days if not a week' seems a bit ungainly 
So small that I could not hear you buzz.
I swatted at you every instant that I spied you,
but you nimbly made your escapes.

You fed on the scum on the sink bowl. sink bowl scum is good, but the phrasing is awkward 
I washed the sink to stop you, to starve you. Do you wash a sink? you clean a sink, surely?
Such a little fly, but well worth the obsession.

Then came that morning when you did not move,
that morning when I got you, then flicked you down the drain
with a tidal wave of water to make sure the threat was gone;
but suddenly I did not feel safe at all.

The winter had arrived, and you were trapped inside.
Perhaps you flew in before the cold came, or came to life
in my garbage bin, rising like a phoenix from the rotting meat. Interesting imagery here

Had I pulled the window up, the cold might have killed you,
stopped you from being my only companion for a week,
but I did not want to pee in the cold.

Perhaps when I got you, you were already dead,
dead from natural causes, sitting at the wing of God
in fly heaven.  I hope so.

Dead from starvation?  I hope not.
I feel ashamed.

Poor fly.  Doomed by everything.  By me.
By time.  By choices.  By life which always dies. 
By God too.  Oh, I am also a fly! The tone is again out of whack here, it is both revelational and conversational? You undercut your own intent.

An interesting idea that needs work on the tone and meter.

I've already made a decision that when I publish my first book or chapbook, I am going to publish the pre-shopworked and post-shopworked versions of many of my poems so that my original version is not lost -- just in case my original version had validity.

This is patently ridiculous. You are the poet; create the version you want. 'Validity' is meaningless here.