Ed Werstein Verse-Virtual 2017 April

April 2017

I am currently the East Region VP of the Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets (wfop.org). I'm in love with another V-V contributor the fantastic Sylvia Cavanaugh. My chapbook, Who Are We Then? was published by Partisan Press. You can find examples of my other work on Your Daily Poem and on Little Eagle's RE/Verse.

An Alternate Ending (or Hamlet??)

Gertrude, as written, becomes the first to die
Drinking deep to Hamlet's sharp success.
Claudius fails to halt the tragic mess,
And many others soon around Gert lie.

Laertes, cut by Hamlet's blade drops next
Then Claudius takes the cup, avoiding sword.
Does Horatio really have the final word?
Or might I, in jest, revise this classic text?

Saved by hanging branch from drowning's brink,
Ophelia drips and staggers back on stage.
She sees the bodies strewn about the place,
Lifts fatal cup, “Oh God, I need a drink!"

Thus could tragedy and comedy be crossed,
And so in idle dreams a poet's labor lost.

Too Soon

It dawned on me that I had really died
before the doctor reached to close my eyes.
My final heaving breath had now been sighed,
my muscles and my nerves each paralyzed.

The neurons in my brain began to fade
and now my gaze was firmly fixed on you.
My final sight, so fine, would be your face
as the life I’d known began to slip from view.

He robbed me then of time, as if on cue.
(So thoughtless was he of my blood, still warm,
that pooled there in my brain maintaining you).
He handed me a cruel and final harm.

He touched my lids and gently closed them down
as I lay still and silent screamed, Too Soon!

Editor's Note: If this poem(s) moves you please consider writing to the author (email address above) to tell him or her. You might say what it is about the poem that moves you. Writing to the author is the beginning of community at Verse Virtual. It is very important. -FF