sometimes I feel like
a lost penny
nobody misses
tossed aside
for a heavy quarter
left to roll
and tumble
[away]
into a storm drain
to brown with age
as a dead lump of zinc
–then, I think of you
and feel like a new penny
freshly minted
put into circulation
with bright blind coppery glow
That’s a down poem, but there’s one problem I had with it. The whole [away] thing. You don’t need the Parentheses type things.
I really liked the flow of it.
The style is good. Nice imagery. It seems more clever each time I read it.
Good poem. It’s sentiment reminds me of one of Shakespeare’s sonnets.
are pennies really made of zinc these days?
On the bracketing --those are brackets not paentheses - there’s a usage and therefore interpretation difference between the two-- of the word “away”, not all of the lines in this poem, as I had originally composed them on the page, are supposed to be flush with the left margin. The word “away” is in brackets for emphasis, like a missing word that an editor adds into a quotation to for it to make better sense, and it was placed well away from the left margin as I had chosen for it to appear, but this site doesn’t allow for unorthodox poem formatting; it forces all lines to be flush against the left margin. Very frustrating. That’s why I don’t post any of my poems where all the lines are all over the place and don’t conform to the fascist margin.
What’s down about it? Yeah, it starts down, but it has a pick-you-up at the end. I’m glad you liked it.
N.
Zinc is either the only element or the primary among several that pennies are composed of nowadays. I believe the US-mint transitioned to zinc as opposed to copper for pennies back in the '70’s possibly the '60’s. Somebody else on this site who has a more thorough numismatic --coin collecting-- background/expertise may be a better source to authenticate that anecdotal speculation. I believe the Mint still uses a trace amount of copper in pennies today.
N.
which sonnet(s) - one of the dark lady sonnets perhaps? Not that it was intentional on my part, but it’s an interesting coincidence.
Thanks for the pos feedback on this old poem of mine Beowulf. your Mosaic poem does the same for me every time I revisit it.
N.[/b]