Thursday, April 24, 2008
The Misfits (poem)
The Misfits
From early on
we knew who we were.
The child hunched over
her book
in the corner of the playground,
the boy with the limp,
the one who was too fat.
In the classroom
we sat silent,
or else went ahead
and revealed what
we knew, never mind the cost.
We were not popular.
Later on we did not get invited
to the parties, the
celebrations
before the game,
the secret meetings
after the dance.
We spent a lot of time
in the library,
alone or with one or two
of the others
who were like us in social quarantine.
We wondered how it was
with Homer,
the blind man with his lyre,
or Vulcan, the crippled artisan,
had Fate wounded them on purpose,
were they chosen young
From early on
we knew who we were.
The child hunched over
her book
in the corner of the playground,
the boy with the limp,
the one who was too fat.
In the classroom
we sat silent,
or else went ahead
and revealed what
we knew, never mind the cost.
We were not popular.
Later on we did not get invited
to the parties, the
celebrations
before the game,
the secret meetings
after the dance.
We spent a lot of time
in the library,
alone or with one or two
of the others
who were like us in social quarantine.
We wondered how it was
with Homer,
the blind man with his lyre,
or Vulcan, the crippled artisan,
had Fate wounded them on purpose,
were they chosen young
for some special task?
Were we?
Were we?
Dorothy Walters
April 22, 2008
(Idealized image of Homer from British Museum via Wikipedia)
