In this prose poem, the title definitely gets the ball rolling by setting the scene, while the following couple of paragraphs delve into the deeper meaning of what it means to enjoy a high. The poem begins with the speaker and his friends lying on a dock while they take in their surroundings in their drug induced state. This description fades off into their adventures outside of a bar and throughout the city, ultimately ending the night back on the dock where the high begins to dull. This poem has a lot of great elements to it, but what I think what you were most successful with was the imagery. Although it wasn’t super sensory, the small descriptors and simple, short, broken sentences were enough to give me a clear picture. You also use a ton of repetition, particularly towards the end, often repeating the ends of the previous sentences (e.g. “a thousand birds jumped at our approach. At our/ approach the city had hidden. The city had hidden as if behind a veil.” Etc.) Both of these elements help with the tone of voice. The short sentences and repetition, which originally allude to the feeling of a wondering mind, help create a very calming, reminiscent tone- conducive to the state they are in. However, toward the end the repetition and the speaker’s thoughts begin to build up, and the reader becomes overwhelmed with this feeling of power, of readiness, that these kids are experiencing. Particularly in the lines “From the ground…and steal us back again,” in which you depict how the drugs have the ability to take them someplace else, yet it still makes them even more present and ready to take on anything.
However, there were a couple things I was unsure of in the poem. First, I didn’t completely understand the point of the man with the stuck zipper. He seemed to pop out of nowhere, which kind of took me out of the moment. I was also confused by the ending. While I’m pretty sure it was just a descriptor of their high fading off on the dock, I am not completely sure, so I would just try and clarify that. But aside from those couple of things, I really enjoyed this poem.