To the World from Me

NOTE: I'm new to the site and this is the first thing I have posted of my work. I've never had someone critique my work before so please feel free to critique your hardest. I would really appreciate it. Thanks.


Tick tock,
Tick tock.
Time is passing by
And all I do
Is sit here looking
Out my window
Watching the leaves turn
From green to red,
Then fall to the ground,
Dieing.
My misery sits here
With me,
Waiting for someone,
Anyone to notice
That all my happiness
Has been nothing more than
An act.
No one looked deep enough
To see that this outside picture
Really isn’t me at all.
The real me is there
Underneath all the pain,
The guilt,
And the fear that has overtaken me.
I couldn’t stop what was
Happening to me,
Nor can I stop turning into
This person who seems to
Be all happy and joyful
All the time.
I know that I cannot
Show my true feelings
To anyone,
But strangers.
Who else would believe me?
I used to sleep with
A fingernail file
Under my pillow
In fear of him.
I’ve been thinking
About placing it under
My pillow again.
It is his entire fault,
It is his fault that I’ve
Turned into this
Plastic thing with no true
Emotion.
It is like I’m not even
All the way human anymore.
It’s like I’m dead on the inside
And there is no springing back to life.
To the world from me,
I feel just like those leaves.

Well, for a first work, this was really good. It did seem a little long-winded without any stanzas or line breaks, so perhaps you could find a way to make it seem a little less like a big chunk and a little more rhythmic.

But anyway, you did a good job with everything--the emotions, the imagery, the setting. Really, I can't seem to find anything wrong with it. Perhaps this is at least partially because some of it hits close to home. I don't know... but I can really connect with it and that's a great thing, being able to write something that at least one person can connect with. It's a hard job, obviously, but it can be done.

Peace, love, chocolate,
Muffin

dead_poet wrote:I've never had someone critique my work before so please feel free to critique your hardest. Thanks.

What a brave soul you are! I poked around for ages before I finally had the guts to post something on YWS.

From green to red,
Then fall to the ground,
Dieing.

It should be "dying" unless you're talking about die-cutting something.

I agree with Muffin - it is a little much to read it all as one big chunk of verse. I would suggest trying to split it up into smaller pieces - they don't have to be uniform stanzas, they don't even need to have similar shapes. It would just make it easier to read if we had somewhere to pause and take in what you've said.

It’s like I’m dead on the inside
And there is no springing back to life.
To the world from me,
I feel just like those leaves.

By the time I've gotten to here, I don't really remember the images you were using at the beginning. If this part were a separate stanza, and the beginning had its own stanza as well, the structure would be a little more parallel and I think readers would be more likely to make the connection.

Also - you used the tick-tock of the clock at the beginning. I was expecting it to come back as a motif, but it never did - just the leaves.

I liked your theme here, especially the reference to turning into a "plastic thing". It's a very personal poem - lots of "I" and "me" - but hey, not all poems are meant to be universal, and sometimes you've just gotta write. In the future, however, I think it would be cool if you explored writing something a little more general - if all of your poetry is in a personal narrative type of style, it kind of limits you. So try going out on a limb, it might be fun.

The comparison of yourself to the leaves is an interesting one, I've never read anything that made me think of it that way. Misery personified is also a cool concept. Keep it up, and I can't wait to read more! :3

This part is the most interesting part of the poem:

Tick tock,
Tick tock.
Time is passing by
And all I do
Is sit here looking
Out my window
Watching the leaves turn
From green to red,
Then fall to the ground,
Dieing.

(Though "dieing" should be spelled "dying.")

The rest of the poem is navel-gazing though, and that's slightly annoying. Yes, your character is sitting there, looking at leaves and wallowing in misery, but that's it. There's only one part where there is conflict that is outside the character, and that is:

I used to sleep with
A fingernail file
Under my pillow
In fear of him.
I’ve been thinking
About placing it under
My pillow again.

That part is interesting, but it fails to please since that is all that is said and it's much too ambiguous.

Look at this lovely poem by Robert Frost, titled "Home Burial." It also involves a character who cannot stand to look outside, but it is different because it describes the conflict, not in words of what the characters feel, so much, but rather what they do and how they act with each other. And, because of their actions, you get the full impact of emotion.

Don't tell us the emotional story -- tell us the full story.

Hope that helps!

dead_poet, edited by Meep wrote:Tick tock,
Tick tock.

Time is passing by,
And all I do
Is sit here looking
Out my window,

Watching the leaves turn
From green to red,
Then fall to the ground,
[s]Dieing[/s] Dead. (note: by the time leaves fall, they're dead)

My misery sits here
With me,
Waiting for someone,
Anyone
To notice
That all my happiness
Has been nothing more than
An act.

No one looked deep enough
To see that this outside picture (note: awkward, rephrase?)
Really isn’t me at all.

The real me is there,
Underneath all the pain,
The guilt
And the fear that has overtaken me.

I couldn’t stop what was
Happening to me,
Nor can I stop turning into
This person who seems to
Be all happy [s]and joyful[/s]
All the time.

I know that I cannot
Show my true feelings
To anyone,
But strangers.

Who else would believe me?

I used to sleep with
A [s]finger[/s]nail file
Under my pillow
[s]In fear of him.[/s] Because I was afraid
Of him.
Lately,
I’ve been thinking
About placing it under
My pillow
Again.

[s]It is his entire fault,
It is his fault that I’ve[/s]
I blame him for
Turne[s]d[/s]ing me into this
Plastic
Thing
With no [s]true[/s] real
Emotion.

It is like I’m
[s]All the way[/s]Not even human[s] anymore[/s].
It’s like I’m
Dead on the inside

There is no [s]springing[/s] bringing me back to life.
(note: or "I'm not coming back to life.")

[s]To the world from me,[/s]
I feel just like those
Leaves.

Okay, so there's a little edit; I've changed a few words and added a few line breaks. Naturally, they're just suggestions: take them and leave them as you please.

So, onto bigger, better things: this is a little boring. There's some imagery at the beginning, but even that's a little trite and clichéd. I think it might be more interesting if you either stuck with the image of the clock ("tick tock/tick tock") or removed it entirely.

I like the idea of misery sitting beside her. It would be really interesting if you personified that. Give misery a human form - maybe she sees him every time she looks out of the corner of her eye? Maybe it's something else entirely.

Maybe work in the idea of acting, or take it out. I think it would be more realistic if you said she's numb/doesn't feel, or at least acts like she doesn't when she's around other people. (The "tough guy/girl" act is way, way easier than the "happy-go-lucky" act.)

I really like "I can't show my feelings / to anyone / but strangers. Who else would believe me?" It's a really interesting and very honest way to express it. This stanza (according to my line breaks there) is my second favorite in the poem. The bit about the nail file? Lovelovelove. It's just perfect.
... but, why a nail file? (I'd think, like, scissors or something.) Just curious. (Are nail files that sharp?)

Now, I also really like the idea of the next two bits, about plastic things and being dead inside, but I think both sections would benefit from more concrete imagery. Especially the plastic one. I thought of Barbie, with her fakey-fakey smile. That might be an interesting image to weave through the whole poem, if that's the direction you try to take it. (Or, just remove this section and stick with the dead stuff; dead leaves (take out the clock), dead inside (take out the plastic). That'd be neat.)
For some reason, defibrillators came to mind for the bit about being dead. Not that you have to use it, but it might be a little more interesting.

So, I think the big Issue here is that you try to accomplish too much. You've got too many wishy-washy images floating around. Instead of trying to include all of that stuff in a vague, emotional sort of way, pick one (or a few) strong image(s) and build the poem around that (or those). Think of the story part as prose: you wouldn't just tell us emotions in prose, would you?

I, personally, think that this poem would be best if it centered on the idea of the nal file under the pillow. Again, you don't have to, but that's such a great image. I like it a lot.

Everyone else has said lots of good things. ^_~

One thing I liked about this is you personified your misery, but I think I would have liked it if you had gone beyond that. Not only are they sitting, but they're a person. Describe what Misery might wear, is it a girl, or a boy, or is it neither? What is their hair like? Do they not even look human? The way you describe Misery (the person) will help describe misery (the emotion) in a more solid way, and if you use the right things, it could work real well. Personifying an emotion is great, imo, because then you step out of the abstract of it, and it becomes solid.

True, it was real navel gazing, but for your first poem it wasn't so bad. I thought it was a bit long, and you were doing lots of telling/speaking. Why not show us? Since you're new to poetry, read more poetry! That will help you out a lot.

First of all, I really liked this poem as a whole. The length didn't bother me, and I liked, to some extent, what was going on in it. Because, guess what. It's true, people do get friggin tired of being someone they're not. Even though this sounded slightly like a whiny emo poem, I liked it.

I'm sure you know by now that "dying" is spelled wrong, or that it should be dead, because, as has been said, the leaves ARE already dead when they are off the tree.

But anyway, I liked the rest of it, even if it was a bit... complaining...
oo, by the way, my favorite parts are the 'tick tock's at the beginning, and when you compare yourself to the leaves, dead (at the end).