Poetry / critique for my "5 senses of your favorite color" poem [10]

Like the Color Orange

Like the moist clumpy residue of Cheetos
coating my fingertips
viscous with absorbed saliva
and cheesy goodness

Like the first pages of a book that's never left a shelf
a whiff cardboard and wood
a chemical tang of binding glue
and printed ink

Like a grease encrusted patty
lettuce limp and soggy meshed with mustard and ketchup
assembled hastily by teenagers working for minimum wage
What a burger

Like the relentless purring:
Tigger
Purring from my feet
Purring from my lap
from atop my history text book
from my shoulder
Strait into my ears

Like the magnet man
Sentenced to long years
On the fridge
Holding calenders
That no one ever uses

The point was describe what your favorite color looks like, feels like, tastes like, smells like, sounds like. I'm not sure I have this down right. I'm open for suggestions and critique.

Thank you

Poetry / Stepmother: Poem with a themes [2]

Our orinial assignment was to write a peom with the theme, I forgive you for... and/or I don't forgive you for. It had to have a theme of then/now. I wrote this.

Stepmother

I can forgive you for dragging me from my bed while the street lights gleam
off the heavy security flashlight hanging from your belt
then forcing me to pick up my brothers' clothes from the bathroom floor,
to scrub the ring of dirt from the tub where my brothers bathed
I can forgive you for lashing out at me in the ER hallway
as my brothers lay immobile behind hospital white curtains,
tubes like black snakes coursing down their throats:
It's your fault, did you do it on purpose? If they die...
I can forgive you for the arguments with my father
thick like the smoke from your Marlboro Lights,
they choke me as I listen from the back seat of second-hand SUV
then, when the haze has burnt off giving me five dollars to remain silent
I can forgive you for letting me go

I can't forgive you for telling your son that he's a retard, that he's worthless.
A child who can state statistics about the Civil War, WWI and WWII,
you tell him to go play his Medal of Honor, and leave you alone,
and encouraging his own brother to do the same.
For pressuring your husband into taking three jobs,
consuming every moment of his day with work,
with cleaning your sons' messes, with cooking you dinner,
for the exhaustion in his voice: "it's Darren, leave a message"
I can't forgive you for keeping them

Now we've been giving the assignment to edit our pieces, I mainly want to take out the literal "I forgive you for/I don't forgive you for." and have those words implied, also I would like to rework the entire second stanza, and change the tense in the first stanza to past tense... are there any suggestions? I'm also open to any other critiques you would like to make.

Poetry / "Obediance" or "Brush Your Teeth" for my final poem? [4]

I have to turn in three poems as my final (they have to be written this term), but I need some advice on two. I think I'm only going with one of them so the one I can improve the most gets added in. Any advice or critique is more than welcome.

1.)
Obedience

She sat on the edge
of the make-up counter,
kicking her feet
first left, then right.
She made faces
at the smoky mirror,
and at the yellowing walls,
and twirled her pigtails.

"Stay" her mother said.
then left.

She sunk back on the ledge
disturbing [piles]
of concealer and tubes
of bright red lipstick.
She plays with the hem
of her dress and wonders
how long she will stay.

2.)
Brush Your Teeth

I peer
into my mirror
and run
my tongue
over my teeth

they are grimy
from last night's untimely
Domino's order;
bits of bread,
peperoni
"say cheese"
and I smile

That's them, I know they are both extremely short, but any help is appreciated.