It’s a broken place where no one wants to play.
The soft sand has gone away, leaving the hard cold earth behind.
The twisted metal has lost its shape, and wants to forget what it once was. There’s no more color here, just the grey of steel wrapped in litter. The swings blow in the wind like lost souls missing their youth. The slide is leaning ready to fall – to fall without grace in perfect humiliation. You can sense the sadness, you can feel the cold, you can taste the bitterness in the air, and you can hear the metal crying with every groan—with every short shrill it aches.
It longs for the days of satisfaction and delight; the days when the children came. They came with their mothers, their fathers, or sometimes with both. The touch of tiny soft fingers made it smile- brought it to life, and made it complete. The sounds of the laughter kept it strong. The smell of ice cream and candy gave it sweet satisfaction. It had a purpose, it had a life, and it knew what it was born to do.
It is in this purgatory that it waits for an absolution.
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You do a really good job creating a mood here! I completely sense the desolation, and the longing. Not an easy task when you're writing about inanimate objects, yet you manage to do it. Terrific!
ReplyDeleteI like this. I had a short poem once that went:
ReplyDeleteLate at night
in a deserted play ground
the wind
pushes her children.
I aways ask thrid graders when I work with them whether they think paygrounds late at night are spooky, and they always nod their heads yes violently, and start to talk about spooky things. I could use this piece as an example of personification. Thanks!