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October I Dunnit
by Kristina Woodhillyou look at my hollowed out eyes
i am the pumpkin
i am the wrinkled sunken thing
feel my furrowed brow beaten
beaten brow
i cut myself from the stem
his knife will not touch me
the orange rich autumn
i could have been
died in his dry summer heat
you stare at my carved jagged teeth
i am the silent scream
i am the unspoken
my slow decay drips
from his brimmed stoned words
don't look for the flicker within
no soft glow will greet eyes
the wick has been stripped
the candle is snuffed
night begins now
10/04/2007
Author's Note: A news story has been developing here of a daughter who after almost 30 years revealed to
authorities that she (at 12) witnessed her mother shoot her father, bury him in their back yard, and told people he had run off with another woman. Apparently she feared for her family and took matters into her own hands. Her photo in the newspapers is haunting and hollow. Nothing good could have come from this.
Posted on 10/04/2007
Copyright © 2025 Kristina Woodhill
| Member Comments on this Poem |
| Posted by Elizabeth Jill on 10/05/07 at 01:08 AM Horrifying, how real life trumps any Halloween tale.
"i am the silent scream
i am the unspoken
my slow decay drips
from his brimmed stoned words"
Chilling read, and mesmerizing writing. |
| Posted by Charlie Morgan on 10/05/07 at 02:54 PM ...kristina, elizaBeth jill says it all buuuuutttt, i gotta add that i was on a lightfantastic trip w/ your words being allll metaphor-ish and yet on the re-read...i too like the way you tell a story...keen! peace, chaz |
| Posted by Kathleen Wilson on 10/06/07 at 04:45 AM Powerful and unusual in symbolism and inspiration, One overtone is the seasonal progression and while it all goes on, autumn, holidays, the glow, there simultanious: the unglow, the hollow the disasterous. the pumpkin being this very girl--whose glow was lost by hollowing, whose hollow cannot hold the warmth. |
| Posted by Rhiannon Jones on 10/07/07 at 01:44 AM "i am the unspoken/my slow decay drips/from his brimmed stoned words"...just one of several really well-crafted phrases here. "Chilling" is right. |
| Posted by Jennifer L Banks on 10/09/07 at 06:21 AM I like this a lot. Chilling to read and good timing! |
| Posted by Quentin S Clingerman on 10/09/07 at 05:40 PM Excellent writing. The symbolism perfect for the newspaper story. Makes one shudder! Think of the guilty secret the daughter had to maintain -- perhaps more difficult for her than the mother keeping it secret. |
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