The eyes

**Nemi** · 08-18-2004, 07:36 PM

The Eyes

Is it so much to ask to feel safe?
To ask for a lock, have it soon.
To want to live,
But without feeling dread.
To sit in ones house,
But without
The eyes.

The eyes that float above you
The eyes that watch you.
Always.
The eyes that follow you,
That see everything,
Without you seeing them

The locksmith failed.
The landlord failed.
The “loved ones” failed.

Is it so much to ask to feel safe?
To ask for a lift, have it now.
To get back home,
But without feeling fear.
To be in the streets
But without
The eyes.

The eyes that sit and watch you
From the coffee shop
Each day
From behind the walls
The eyes that follow.
And speed up if you run.

No one really cared.
No one believed me.
No one listened.

But it’s over now
The eyes will not haunt me
There is no fear
There is no dread
Now, I have safety.
In Death, you cannot be hurt.

I know this isn't very good, but I was wondering how others interpreted this. I showed it to a friend of mine, and he saw a totally different angle, a different view about what was going on, from what I had originally intended. (I'm not sure if thats a good or bad thing :/)

**Koa** · 08-19-2004, 11:44 AM

It's good

To me it feels like you have a sense of oppression, like overprotection maybe... I gest this feeling from this especially:

The eyes that sit and watch you
From the coffee shop
Each day
From behind the walls
The eyes that follow.
And speed up if you run.

But at the same time there's a need for protection:

Is it so much to ask to feel safe?
To ask for a lift, have it now.
To get back home,
But without feeling fear.

but it turns out to be protection from the eyes... almost like running away from a stalker in some sense... Or a Big Brother sort of thing, like your life is too controlled...even at the point of having death as the only solution....

So probably the main feeling I get from it is like fear of oppression... I don't know what more to say, I find it's a quite complicated poem, not so open and evident

I particularly don't understand this bit:

The locksmith failed.
The landlord failed.
The “loved ones” failed

.
In what did they fail? In protecting?

As for the different interpretations, I'm afraid you can't help it, and it's not a too bad thing... Everyone feels things differently, even when our experiences are similar we relate to things in a slightly different way... And poetry and art can't help being loved for different reasons by everyone (think of your favourite songs, they probably mean something to you because you relate to them somehow, but maybe the songwriter didn't mean what you see in them...But you do see that and it's not wrong, it's actually good to finde more nuances and meanings to every piece of art). Just wanted to give you an opinion

**Helga** · 09-03-2004, 07:00 AM

I feel like it's about depression, about feeling alone in the world and that noone can help you. in a way it seems like a suicide note.

I love it when poems show new metaphors about this feeling of somone following or watching you.

How do you like my interpretation.?.

**atiguhya padma** · 09-03-2004, 10:47 AM

For me, there are two different interpretations, one political, one religious. It could be taken to mean a kind of Big Brother surveillance (in my hometown there are loads of CCTV's all over the place, especially near the coffee bar I go to - yet I still had a bike stolen from there), or it could refer to the belief in a deific dictator.