Poetry Post: Heroic Couplets

Eighteen lines of heroic couplets in iambic pentameter. I wanted to write about something happy, but after seeing this girl at the mental institution where I work this semester, nothing happy came to mind. Not my best day ever.
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All in One

At first she seems so simple and composed,
but watch... and down the rabbit-hole she goes
inside her mind, and never bats an eye.
A carousel of people whirling by
behind the placid stare; they want to speak,
they only want to help when she is weak,
for none of them would live were she to die.
They rage when she cannot defend, and cry
when the center cannot hold; the pieces left
behind by trauma and fear, each person cleft
from her, their host, and lashing out in pain.
Their handiwork: the scars that still remain
on her once unblemished arms. The angry one
once tried to drown her, and very nearly won.
As I observe her in her room, I see
the multiple, the girl with D.I.D.;
the girl with scars, with fears, with pain and doubt,
the girl who tried to take the wrong way out.

Poetry Post: Blank Verse

Iambic pentameter is the least of your worries when battling writer's block. There really was a mantis watching me work. Ever had a bug for a muse? It's a strange experience.
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Mantis
---

The praying mantis perching near my book
stays safely out of reach, where she can watch
with compound eyes unblinking; every move
is analyzed. It’s hard to concentrate
and read with her in silent audience,
though I stopped watching her some time ago.
I reach to try and touch her sticklike frame.
She tilts her angled head so quizzically
at first, and inches back uncertainly,
then looks away to feign disinterest
in boring, docile humans like myself.
It’s cute. ...diversionary fun, but cute.
I try to leave her be and read my book,
but when I turn around again, she’s gone,
and all my entertainment goes with her.