Butterfly

(Note: I'm not an expert at writing poems so the formatting is probably wrong. Feel free to tell me how exactly you're supposed to do it. Also, I wrote this from the perspective of my 7 year old self. So yeah, enjoy!)

"We have to go," the gruff voice of my father said.
What? Why? I was too confused to answer.
"Come on dear," mother coo'd, grasping my little wrist and tugging me away.
I gazed back at the red bricked home, frowning.
Were we going shopping?
I sat on the lumpy grey seat in old old, dull car
My brother dozing beside me.
"Where are we going?" I wanted to ask.
I couldn't bring myself to say it, though.

A while past before we reached a large building.
A mall?
Malls didn't have people with lots of big bags.
Everyone was rushing around,
Like ants going to their nests,
or Bees buzzing in their hives.
Mother and father lead me through weird gates,
that blinked and beeped when you passed through them.

Eventually we were in a large car with wings,
A very big car with a loud hum.
The inside made my ears pop
And the chairs were squishy like marshmallows.
"Buckle up," mom reminded me.
I did just that.
"Where are we going?" I finally asked.
"We're going home," mom stated calmly.

Home? But we just left home to go shopping!
Right?
We lifted off the ground,
And I thought my stomach was trying to fly away
Like a fleeing butterfly,
Leaving its home for good.

One og the things I really love about formatting is that you can do anything you want as long as it sounds good. This poem has a really nice rythem. Everything seemed to be in the right place (Those words that should be alone and those that should be part of the next line seemed correct.)

In fact the only crituque I have is this line

"Where are we going?" I wanted to ask.

Probably shouldn't have quotation marks. It takes a second to relize it as aloud, but even that moment of hesitation is enough to break the awesome flo you have going on.

Hallo!

I don't really like how this poem started out very prose-like. That's probably just me, but who knows? The second line seems a little too far out. I also feel like in the beginning, you could have split the lines up so they aren't just sentences with enter hit after them: Give it flow. Give it words that better express the dynamics. Give it passion. It may be based on a story, but this is a poem: make it poetic. Give it words you didn't know you didn't know; give it words that sing out to the world. Don't just tell us that your brother was dozing, tell us if there was a snot bubble on his nose, tell us if he snored. Don't just say "red-brick home"; give it a personality and a life and a wonderment. I like your basis, but this could resonate so much more with the reader. By the end of the first stanza, the reader is bored. The reader wants to see this as a poetic story, not just prose with line breaks at sentences.

The second stanza. In the first line, it should be "passed" and not "past"; no comma after "around" in the fourth line, no capitalisation on "Bees" in the sixth if you want to keep your regularity through. Capitalise Father, since it's a name from a child for their parent, no comma after "gates". Also, I have to reiterate from the first stanza: This feels more like a story than a poem. It just doesn't have a... poet feel. Emphasize it! Give it a life. Show us what happened, don't tell us.

Third stanza - comma after "pop", capitalise "Mom" both places where you have it. I also really don't like how you let the reader wonder if it was an airport or not until you described the aeroplane like that, for some reason. It feels a little stilted. The line "I did just that" conveys NO emotion whatsoever. None. It's just you TELLING the reader something. Make us feel your confusion and your lostness, don't just tell us about those things.

Fourth stanza - I liked the simile at the end of this, but... really. This was probably my favourite stanza. It's much less story-like than the first three, somehow.

I just want to say that you have a good basis, and you have an idea that could be expanded upon. Please, please try to get better, try to improve. I am by no means the end-all resource for poetic knowledge; this is just my review, and I feel that this poem could have been so much better. As it is, it reads like a stilted piece of prose that's been abandoned for a while.

And, just saying, there is no "right way" to do poetry. There's definitely a wrong way, but the right way is whatever you make of it.