If You Were Metal Poem by Wanda Swim Strunk

If you were metal
You would be copper.
Shiny and malleable
And made into useful things
Like pots and pans
And fish shaped molds
That hang on kitchen walls

If I was metal
I would be gold
Dirty gold long forgotten at the bottom of a jewelry box
A necklace you took for a noose
I am unrealized gold
I lay waiting
for someone to polished me up then
they would have something

And she?
She is silver
Silver that could have been a sterling fork used at fancy dinner parties
Instead
She is cheap
Maybe a ring or bracelet sold at a flea market
She looks like something that should be good
But she is just an imitation of her wishes.