[RCrawford]

Less traditional. ABBACDDCEFEFGG. Slant rhymes. And CREEPY. I chose this one because it was effective. I wanted to call the police after reading it. TWISTED. I thought I saw in it an allusion to Roethke’s “My Papa’s Waltz.” Not to mention countless horror stories. Do I believe the narrator could even try to mourn? No. The use of enjambments serve to heighten the tension “…get me off/and go,” “somewhere/safe, I swear” but it’s the language that really establishes the psycho portrait: he is “distressed” that she’s stopped breathing (coughing); he believes he has been her “chaperone,” and the disturbing use of the word “finished” in the first line. I didn’t want to think about this poem, but I did. Good work.