Patricia Smith Poetry
I recently wrote this poem about Katrina, in a forum someone said that it was alarmingly derivative of Patricia Smith, I have read Smith's work extensively, but i didn't steal any of her lines or change the words of one of her pieces does that mean I hijacked her style?
Katrina,
5th cousin removed from lineage,
back of the job-line,
em-barass-ment at the family
reunion,
lost religion,
saved by hoodoo trapstars,
bitch of a woman.
Changed your name, but
can't stomach the bastard
baby you now got,
you swallowed your kids whole,
spat back,soggy flesh
tattered
leather shoes
vomited into the pissy city
soup
Nights like this remind me of
bourbon
street liqour begging your attention,
as memory is pissed out after
drink number two.
Their bodies stink from terror,
clay-faced kids parade swampy
playgrounds waiting to be rescued from
the jungle gym, skin begins to
prune.
Watch as time meets watches
of tardy FEMA men
touching your
body sold,
enter the chorus of
screams through
the night!
you better close them eyes tight
gasp-
wait for air.
breaching barricades for coins
those lone survivors
clench tight
around metal
for life
to the sign that says stop.
Katrina,
child from nothin'
think you can call death that
won't come full circle.
Katrina,
5th cousin removed from lineage,
back of the job-line,
em-barass-ment at the family
reunion,
lost religion,
saved by hoodoo trapstars,
bitch of a woman.
Changed your name, but
can't stomach the bastard
baby you now got,
you swallowed your kids whole,
spat back,soggy flesh
tattered
leather shoes
vomited into the pissy city
soup
Nights like this remind me of
bourbon
street liqour begging your attention,
as memory is pissed out after
drink number two.
Their bodies stink from terror,
clay-faced kids parade swampy
playgrounds waiting to be rescued from
the jungle gym, skin begins to
prune.
Watch as time meets watches
of tardy FEMA men
touching your
body sold,
enter the chorus of
screams through
the night!
you better close them eyes tight
gasp-
wait for air.
breaching barricades for coins
those lone survivors
clench tight
around metal
for life
to the sign that says stop.
Katrina,
child from nothin'
think you can call death that
won't come full circle.