Classmate Response 2: Week of 4/17/11

Jami Miller: Random Impulse


Skittles of the rainbow
dropping off
one by one into a dark maze
heading to the bottom
of the slate rectangle
that holds this candy
in the palm of it's hand
until it's all eaten by the shark
that controls it's taste.

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I loved this poem! The flow of the poem was served really well by the line breaks and the fact that it's a single sentence. It never felt like a long sentence or a short poem; it was the delightful bite-sized mirror of the candy. It was effectively bleak, too. The language about "dark maze" and "shark" and the aspect of its taste being "controlled" was a nice contrast in tone to the imagery of Skittles and rainbows. That reminded me of what we read for class about taking poems into unexpected directions. I think the only thing that was potentially confusing was the shark; it might be that I didn't read all of the layers of the poem but I was confused about exactly who or what the shark represents. But I hesitate to say "add more," because part of the beauty of this poem is its concise delivery. Anyway, great job!