Once Again: Poem Inspired by Billy Collin's "Litany"

     Here's a poem I wrote in this class. This was inspired by the poem "Litany" by Billy Collins. 

Once Again 

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”  

–F. Scott Fitzgerald 

You are the boat beating against the current, 

borne back ceaselessly into the past. 

You are the ring of water left by a glass 

and chalk on the pavement. 

You are the first ripple that forms after a stone hits the water, 

and you are the last. 

However, you are not a sock who has lost its pair, 

a salt shaker, 

or the broken cabinet door. 

And you are certainly not fresh snow on the ground. 

There is just no way that you are fresh snow on the ground. 

It is possible that you are cookies baking in the oven, 

or maybe one of those trees that smells like butterscotch, 

but you are not even close 

to being an after-dinner mint. 

You can easily see 

that you are neither a deflated balloon  

nor the old pants at the bottom of the drawer. 

As we are speaking of metaphors, 

you may want to know what I am. 

I am the first spark that pops from a sparkler on the Fourth of July. 

I am also the pen and the paper, 

the dust that flies off your shoe, 

the last ember of a dying fire. 

I am a perfectly toasted marshmallow, 

and the raindrop that races down your car window. 

But don’t worry, you are still the boat beating against the current. 

And I am too. 

We will always beat on, boats against the current, 

borne back ceaselessly into the past.  

     I hope everyone that's taken junior English appreciated my favorite quote from The Great Gatsby. Let me know what you think!

                                                     

                                                                            --Brianna