xenophobia

3 posts
User avatar
Gender Female
Points 955
Reviews 14
All of your precautions,
you're careful protection,
never fail you, if you can help it.

Intentions so pure,
seduced by safety's allure,
there's no obstacle beyond your confrontation.

there's no room for harm and tears,
your world, devoid of mistakes and fears,
holds all of your attention.

Evolution passes you by,
in desperation, you shield your eyes.
never learning through your caution,
of the world you've fallen voluntarily behind.
Last edited by originalhobbit on Fri Aug 12, 2011 12:42 pm, edited 2 times in total.
"Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one's definition of your life; define yourself." ~Harvey Fierstein




User avatar
Gender Female
Points 9692
Reviews 3900
Hey originalhobbit!

First of all, you might want to check for typos again... there's one in the first line which is a bit glaring. ;)

Now! For your poem! One thing I would like is that you get out of the abstract and into reality. Right now, you are so abstract that it makes everything vague and rather confusing. What exactly are you talking about, besides the fear of strangers? You might want to bring something concrete to this so we can better visualize it. Otherwise, it's all very vague.

Just a thought! :)
Ubi caritas est vera, Deus ibi est.

"The mark of your ignorance is the depth of your belief in injustice and tragedy. What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the Master calls the butterfly." ~ Richard Bach

Moth and Myth <- My comic! :D




User avatar
Gender None specified
Points 72525
Reviews 1220
Hi there. Like Snoink already mentioned, this poem is very vague. There's nothing concrete that your readers can directly relate to or that will stick in their minds, so this poem is not as memorable as it could be. Giving specific examples of how the "you" in this poem acts is one way of grounding this poem, and it gives you an opportunity to incorporate some vivid and memorable imagery.

The structure of the poem could also use a bit of work. You have a really weak rhyme in the first stanza, and I didn't realize there was a rhyme until the third since I thought that the rhyme in the second stanza had been unintentional. There are a couple of reasons for this: the first is that the meter, or number of syllables in each line, is inconsistent for the rhyming lines. This wouldn't be so bad if you had a set pattern of syllables for each line within the stanza, such as a 3-5-7 scheme, but there isn't a pattern. Since rhymes are a form of pattern, a lack of pattern in the meter results in a failed or off-sounding rhyme.

I suggest that you focus on establishing a meter first, before you try and rhyme things. A poem with an excellent meter can sound just as good as a rhyming poem, if not sometimes better. Also, incorporating a stronger rhyme in the first stanza would help make it more obvious that there is a rhyme scheme in the poem.
Secretly a Kyllorac, sometimes a Murtle.
There are no chickens in Hyrule.
Princessence: A LMS Project
WRFF | KotGR



The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity.
— Amelia Earhart