I am not my Country.

Arguably, not my best poem ever- but i really needed to express this thought.

Blue skies and green beneath,
but what belies is beyond belief.

I have no borders or check points.
No flags or regalia.
No monuments or visas.
Nor does language define me.

If a man is his country,
his home and his hearth.
So who existed before.
Hammurabi's remarks?

Wow, this is a really thoughtful poem! I enjoyed it a lot. It flowed nicely, and each word has a purpose in the poem; the compactness of this thought is awesome!

Nor does language define me.

This line just seems off, especially after the period in the previous line.
With a comma, it may flow a bit better. Then again, I like commas too much, so that may be just me .

If a man is his country,
his home and his hearth.
So who existed before.
Hammurabi's remarks?

The punctuation in this last stanza seems off. I would organize it like this...

If a man is his country,
His home and his hearth,
Then what existed before?
Hammurabi's remarks?

...but that's just me .

The last line is really impressive, in the sense that it leaves an impression on the reader. After this I just thought, "Wow. He has a point." Great job! I pretty much loved this. PM me if you have any questions!

River

I'm I right in thinking that this was borne from an in depth conversation you had? *winks.

I agree with all of elephantwalrus' points, this poem is very thought provoking. The title is especially strong. A good amount of consideration went into each idea which makes for a rewarding read. I actually felt like I had learnt something after finishing it. So well done.

This is, in reality however, the beginnings of a piece. There are many things that you must consider when editing. One would be strengthening the message by more poetic devices. You are a poet- so why not show off a bit? Show us what you've got, a personification here, a simile there. You catch my drift.

Happy editing!

Eimear

Eimear is right. This piece is absolutely lovely in the way it conveys the message and it reads so smoothly, but it would be so much better and the message would be so much stronger if you made more use of all the literary tools you have. However, with this poem, use them sparingly and make them simple. Weighing this down with too many literary devices would overshadow the point you are trying to make.

Bravo, this was brilliant!! It's short but it sends a very strong message and it makes you think. I see no grammatical errors...so all in all I thought this was well written and simple and...I'm running out of words to say because there's really only one word to sum what I have to say all up...Beautiful!!

your poetry is strong. Every word has it's stance. I can tell this is a strong talent of yours to allow words to fall where they, not only will, but where they belong. I respect writers with a broad vocabulary. And I've been so far keeping up with your posts and all of your writings are consistent with a style in strength. Keep them coming

You do realize that every piece you right is fantastic? So you can stop with the disclaimers at the top, because even if it was not your best piece, we would still review it all the same. Good work


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The most vicious and dangerous of all animals is the reviewer, it waits in silence for its victim. And then it pounces, throwing the would be writer off guard, we disect their work and pick apart their entrails. Lock your doors, bar your windows too bad! We will enter through your internet....

Very nice, it really dose have a great meaning behind it I really like it, it is so simplistic but yet very hard hitting and important. I would love to read much more of this as I really enjoyed it and I think that, that is my only criticism really that it could be longer, and there were a few spelling and grammar errors in there I believe but hey don't worry I'm dyslexic to mate as you well know but we won't let that stop us. Still a very good piece of work indeed I can't wait to read more of your work, in fact I'll do that right now. Talk later mate!!