A Short Slam Poem I wrote. Thanks for reading :) Please review!
(PS: Because Slam poetry is meant to be spoken, it is written how I speak. Sorry if some of you written poets out there cry at my lack of rhyme scheme or something.)
For Eliza.
Disclaimer: Not a speck of him.
Freak
"Freak's here, let him in."
She spoke into her walkie talkie.
She raised the caution tape and I ducked under,
Tugging John behind me.
Freak.
Coming from her, it was just a title.
A nickname, formulated in her mind
to label my capabilities,
To put a stamp on my intelligence.
The insult echoed in my mind,
bounced around and through my thoughts
like an insect in a streetlamp, trapped, burning.
I tightened my hand around John's weathered wrist.
Comfort? Maybe.
He was my best friend, though I'd never tell him.
Colleague.
Another label, separating him from me,
the freak from the soldier.
The wild wind howled as I strode towards the crime scene,
Trying to stand up tall,
My cold exterior and wool coat not showing
the numerous scars the verbal stabbings had left.
I kept track of them,
all in the back corner of my mind.
Freak's here. One.
Whatever, Freak. Two.
Call Freak to finish the job. Three.
147 times. 147 jabs to the heart I'd taken from her.
This month.
Though John had only heard that word fall from her lips 19 times.
I didn't tell him it was the worst.
She could call me a psychopath, a jerk, a geek, good-bad-ugly-whatever!
But freak - oh, no - freak brought back all the years of trauma,
All the years my elder brother was forced to pick me up
off the playground mulch,
Bruised, and broken.
"He got beat up again, the little freak."
So I held on to John for dear life,
added another tick mark to my tally,
And tried to delete the hard memories
from the roadmap of my mind,
and took this token of John's friendship in my pocket
to try to soothe the pain.