I loved you, Godzilla,
and my little boys loved you,
at the local drive-in
forty-odd years ago;
and their father as well,
who is dead now ...
but you, dear Godzilla, never die,
not even when you're attacked
with gigantic versions of the sparklers
we used to wave on Guy Fawkes' Night,
all sizzling and coruscating
and bouncing off your hide.
Poor clumsy Godzilla,
not even faintly humanoid,
but lumbering and alien
and rather dumb,
so slow you came across
as the underdog.
I mean, you couldn't do anything
with grace, elegance, finesse or panache —
your special effects were creaky.
We didn't even speak the same language!
You were weird (not in a good way).
You were the big ugly. You were just wrong.
Yet there was something about you.
We felt you were misunderstood.
We blamed it on your upbringing.
We knew that somewhere within
you were really good — anyway,
we were on your side. You became
our favourite monster (even dearer
than sad, persecuted King Kong).
What a pity you couldn't win an Oscar.
You could have brandished it high,
in in-your-face triumph: "This
is for all the misfits!"
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 unported, 2.5 generic, 2.0 generic and 1.0 generic licence.
|Description={{ja|1=石川県珠洲市のゴジラ岩}}
|Source=投稿者が撮影。PENTAX LX + smc PENTAX-FA★ 1:4.5 300mm ED & IF
|Author=名古屋太郎
|Date=2006-11
April Poem A Day Challenge 2014, day 27: a monster poem
Published in She Too, a collaboration with Delaina J Miller, Helen Patrice and Leigh D C Spencer (Kansas City, Content X Design, 2014) [See right side-bar]
Linked (April 2016) to Dark Poetry for the Cruellest Month: Poetizing Japanese Folklore (Godzilla is modern Japanese folklore; I say so!)
