Death is Death
A poem by the eleven-year-old me.
There’s only two kinds of people:
Those who do this [ ] with
Their controller when Super Mario has to jump
And dead people.
Hand and eye are so rarely coordinated in the
Dead folks I’ve seen. I know because I myself
Was a zombie before I got the Power Pad (and the Zapper).
They woke me up and gave me enough life to crave
A Power Glove.
I even bugged my dad for one—knowing he’d say
I could have one when I had enough of my own
Money to buy it. ‘Cause that’s how he is.
More living to do, I guess.
I’ve been playing the game ever since that week
With a fury in my heart, making Super Mario grab
Every coin laid out for him and timing that tinkling clink of
Reward with the beat of it. I hold down the B button like a
Speed demon and do my controller like this [ ] over gaps in the board
Without thinking.
I do my controller like this [ ] up the
Valedictory staircases headed to the flag and
Fireworks that hail my arrival at some new castle (I
look like a spazz in the middle of a good Turtle Tip!),
Ready to learn enough life lessons to get rich from a paper route.
My work in the Super Mario field has also taught me
“The Flinch”. You know, the one that comes to the living when
Super Mario dies in the water if he can’t get to air before the
Clock runs down. The same one that happens on advanced
Levels when, for whatever cosmically weird reason, you forget to do
This [ ] with your controller and instead think you can just run through
A giant spiked turtle throwing hammers at you or skim Christ-like across
Some lake of fire.
“Practice makes Perfect” is the prayer my hands make when I’m
Going forward faster than I can pay attention to. So, my hands just
Go like this [ ] with my controller.
My girl cousins have a Ouija board,
So I know they understand. . .
Comments
There are no comments for this story
Be the first to respond and start the conversation.