Poppies

• Spasms of paper red, disrupting a blockage of yellow bias around your blazer
• blackthorns of your hair. All my words flattened, rolled, turned into felt, slowing melting ... threw it open, the world overflowing like a treasure chest
• after you'd gone I went into your bedroom, released a songbird from its cage
• the dove freely against the sky, an ornamental stitch, I listened, hoping to hear your playground voice catching on the wind
• Spasms of paper red, disrupting a blockage of yellow bias binding around your blazer

  Spasms- pain of saying goodbye + dying in war, imagining death

  Plosive- fear + foreshadows death
• Blackthorns of your hair. All my words, flattened, rolled, turned to felt, slowly melting ... threw it open, the world overflowing like a treasure chest

  Nature- spikey and painful- unable to touch him for fear she will not be able to let go

  Material imagery- feelings and emotions

  Juxtaposition sensory imagery- difference in emotions of mother and son
• After you'd gone, I went into your room and released a songbird from its cage 


  Son is songbird- poet new identity
• The dove freely against the sky, an ornamental stitch, I listened, hoping to hear your playground voice catch the wind

  Dove- peace and freedom

  Allusion- dove used to lead boats, suggests the son has found land, happiness

  Wishes for son back