The Sorrow of Hearts

by Andrew Dufresne
Wild Poetry Forum
Second Place, April 2017
Judged by R.T. Castleberry


All day I have been rearranging my body
to fit the world. It’s hopeless. I can’t leave
anything behind. I drag all memories
after, a kite’s tail in a blue-grey sky.

Flying, I can see fields below, fields where
I once played, had my first kiss. There
is the young girl I taught to be cruel when
I was so cruel to her. I sigh. She laughs.

All my former selves live together in
a small house frozen in that one moment
when you think nobody is looking. They
argue about everything, forever.

We forget goodness, are famished
for kindness, nothing is enough. Nothing
except sorrow. The sorrow of hearts spills
into all souls. Nowhere else to keep it.


Precise, unsentimental writing with some fine surrealistic touches. The opening line immediately grabs the reader's attention. And other great lines follow: There/is the young girl I taught to be cruel when/I was so cruel to her; We forget goodness, are famished/for kindness, nothing is enough. --R.T. Castleberry