the nightmall dream v1.5

[dukealien]

the nightmall dream



The monolith
rises. The highway ends,
the parking lot begins. Evenings flocked
by starlings -- scrub it out, scrub it out.  Nice foreshadowing of the act to come.

Once, and not a more sustained
adverb, we used to wait. Words, we claimed,
were never enough -- we said sorry but  words never enough - again justifying the act to come.
we couldn't connect, broke our lines in  nice line break (breaking-in our dramatic lines)...
the wrongest ways, rhymed without purpose, caressed good internal rhyme (wrongest/carressed)

you run from crimes you don't remember. you can't look back. rationalizing the act again
you reach the lot. you dig for keys: the guards, half on foot and half on segways, track lovely snap back to the original meaning of segue,  smooth/purposeful/meaningful transition
like hounds. instead of guns they've tied together sticks, and your bombshell partner's  now the violence
deserted you: she's covered the way to your car in slicks, in jelly beans. "rhymed without purpose" sticks/slicks
the tires skid. as you fly away to heaven, she sucks in the sound   how many virgins does this bomb earn?
of the supermarket, butchers splitting wings from legs.  last phrase is terrific (in both senses) - the aftermath

Not being much of a free verse stylist, not many critical suggestions - more thought on interpretation and structure.

As my comments above show, I (perhaps very wrongly) see this as, or referring to, a terrorist bombing - maybe the remote second-person trigger variation - starting with dislike for the commercial monolith that must be rubbed out, the rationalization that only the act will do, and the act at last with its slippery, scattered body parts.

The three stanzas each take a different voice - first (mostly) objective, second "we" explaining - "our" manifesto, as it were.  And the third using "you" to put the reader in the midst of the action with the authorial viewpoint looking over his shoulder, commenting.

So apologies if that's all wrong and a more innocent guilt was intended.  A good read, and it made me think... even if the thinking hared off in  total divergence.  Night dreams don't have to make waking sense.