The Launch

[alatos]

the poem start off well with some good imagery and then become more of a puzzle to work out which i don't think i did. maybe i need to read it a few more times.

The day was different now,
and yes, she would walk out into
the garden of unruly ferns
and plump mosses. the opening stanza draws me in and makes me want more.

The vegetable world was unaware
that the day was different now.
Maybe it was only her mind:
maybe, she feared, it was. the abstract here works for the time being.

The sun was oblivious,
up there in its nest of cloud.
And though the day itself had changed,
the cicadas remained inconsiderate. there is a great image in this stanza

Those rude buggers, and the sun and plants!
Ignorant creatures, that could be so unaware
that the day now differed entirely,
and everything was new.

No, it had not been in her mind.
Unfounded fear. A heresy
against her reborn spirit.
And yet, although she knew for me, this stanza doesn't add enough to the poem to warrant keeping.

The sun and the cicadas,
blind idiots, and all other  
forms of life that creep
about the earth, and fly, and swim,

Were without reason's inspiration,
she also knew that she herself,
(bloody, abortive pill)
that she herself was unreasonable.

At times. As a child. Was she?
Was she a premature unhinging
of the self's supremacy, a return
to the primitive of images, this stanza starts to lose my attention.

emotions without words? Could she
speak yet? But the day had felt so
different. But now it was the same.
But wait! because again this is losing my attention.

there, in the beam of light that
cut aslant the porcelainberry growing
up the rotten shed across the street
a catbird launches its lightness with a shriek. this last stanza feels almost perfect but the preceding couple of stanza weaken it somewhat.

Thank you both for your feedback. I think I agree with your comment on stanza 5, Billy. The attempt here was to portray a disjointed state of mind as experienced by the protagonist. Seems it fell short.