Abortion

Baby End


Monday, I was an egg
In my Mother’s womb.

Tuesday, I was conceived
And started growing.

Wednesday, I got a foot
And started kicking.

Thursday, I grew ears
And heard shouting.

Friday, my Mother cried
And I cried with her.

Saturday, I get lifted out
Of my Mother and killed.

Sunday, my life is over
Before it began.

I like the idea that every day of the week there is a new growth for the speaker of the poem.

I take it that you're pro-life. Since you writing it from that angle, you could use another way of describing the abortion. 'I got lifted out/ Of my mother' is very light and shows little of what they actually do during abortions. It might be better to use accurate details to get your point across of how gruesome they really are.

Other than that, I really like the idea and simplicity of this poem. It's lovely. It's interesting how you indicate there is life even before conception. I haven't encountered that before.

Keep writing!

Calmmermaid,

I don't think by wednesday you would have gotten a foot. And I'm skeptical about growing ears a day later. And the last stanza makes absolutely no sense. Your life obviously began already. Moving on. the poem its self is quite good. You've chosen your stance and you're sticking to it. Right on. My favorite stanza is stanza five, because you brought out an emotional appeal, showing a bond between mother and child (although, again, I highly doubt you could actually form tears :p). Build around that?

Good writing,
--Medusa.

Hello new member calmmermaid ^_^ First of all, I'd like to welcome you to YWS and encourage you to review a few things before you post. Try to keep it so that for every one thing you've posted of your own work, you've reviewed two things by someone else. Now on to your poem!

This reads more like a sign at an anti-abortion rally than a poem, and isn't helped by the poll at the top. Making a point while writing poetry is often very effective, but writing poetry just to make a point doesn't often succeed on the poetry end of things.The progression of emotions between mother and child is a solid foundation, but it doesn't really consider them too deeply, just the fact that they exist.

The line "and heard shouting" for example. How does the baby perceive shouting? Is it muffled through its mother's stomach, and how does it feel about the shouting? For everything that's happened in this short week, it doesn't seem to affect the baby very much until the very end, when s/he just says "I get lifted out/ of my Mother and killed" as if it's just a statement of fact with no emotion attached. Consider the connections between people, especially the connections the baby feels to the world and to his/her mother.

Happy writing!

hi.
i think it's interesting to read stuff about issues of today, and it was brave, really, to write a poem about this, but i have two main arguments against this piece;
i don't think that this kind of topic makes good poetry. Sorry, it's just my opinion. To me, these topics are for debates and essays, and don't seem to make emotive and beautiful poetry.
Secondly, it's easy to take an opinion on abortion without knowing the facts. It can be the most difficult decision for a woman, and their partner in many cases, to make. If i woman has a family already and having this baby would mean a huge risk of her death, there is no way that having the baby would be recommended or pushed towards: the woman is already an established life with other lives that may depend on her. I understand that abortion is serious and shouldn't be used as a contraception or a way to deal with a problem facing a career etc, but it hurts to see people saying abortion shouldn't be allowed. They are obviously very naive and have never been in such a situation.

i just needed to say that. Please consider it all.
best of luck with your other work.
from charlie.

Charliebo - This is the Poetry forum, not the Debate forum. Most of your post was argumentative, not a critique...so please try to critique without debating!

That said, the poem invited debate, particularly because of the poll. In the future, calmmermaid, please consider that a no-no! I'll basically echo what Leja said and advise that writing a poem to make a point usually does not make for good poetry. Unlike Medusa, though, I don't have a problem with the illogical progression of time versus the development of the speaker's body. Poetic license allows you to change these things for the poem, so don't be afraid of that. Just know that the poem reads like a 'pro-life' chain letter! I feel that there is no emotion other than a broad anti-abortion message, and that's why the poem falls on its face.

-Colleen

I thought it was interesting that something new happens every day of the week. I like this idea a lot; you could do a lot with it.

suprising this thread hasn't been locked. Some other threads about abortion have been.

this could start an argument but then again it's a poem.

But to the other reviewers of this. She hasn't made a stance within the lines to show how she feels towards abortion. She simple offers up a perspective. But for every perspective, there is an ifinite other number of perspectives.

I like the basic idea to this piece, however I don’t think it was executed properly. I could go on for a while about why, but others before me have already pointed most of it out. Still if I were you I would take the idea and expand on it.

This is not a forum open to debate, this is a piece of work, if you are not here to leave a critique then there is no reason for you to post something.

Also, this hasn’t been locked because it’s a person’s work, not a post in a forum or something like that. Works can be locked, but it doesn’t happen very often.

The only advice I could give is:
This isn't much of a poem. I like the idea, stick with it, but I don't think you could call this grouping of words a poem. It only looks a poem. What you should try is

1) Adding rhythm
2) Metaphors & Similes
3) The 5 (or maybe 6 if you want) senses.
4) Imagery & Voice

Good luck!

Wojovox wrote:suprising this thread hasn't been locked. Some other threads about abortion have been.

this could start an argument but then again it's a poem.

But to the other reviewers of this. She hasn't made a stance within the lines to show how she feels towards abortion. She simple offers up a perspective. But for every perspective, there is an ifinite other number of perspectives.

On the contrary, I think the poem was quite anti-abortion, overtly so, which is why I felt it was written only to prove a point, and was thus half-hearted as a poem. calmmermaid, I think it would be in your best interest to write about this in a more subtle way. This poem is so obviously about abortion and so obviously against it, it's less fun to read for the reader because the story was contrived to prove a point. I think it ought to be the other way around; your poem should tell a story/describe a scene first, and the "point" or "moral" should come after that.

(Wojovox - as this is a literary work and not a Debate thread, it will not be locked unless the posting gets out of hand. Please, guys, focus on the literary merits of the poem and not just on the political commentary! If you would like to argue for or against abortion, please go to the Debate forum, where there is a thread for this, but remember to be civil and thoughful!)

-Colleen

still see it as a neutral stance. Because as you said yourself, it is a literary work, not debate. Though you may perceive it to be anit-abortion and she writing it may intended it to be that way, the piece still makes no official stance. Just like painting a picture, you paint what you see, not what you wish to see.

I mentioned the lock down because there is another abortioin thread I came across and it was locked preventing me from voicing my opinion. Isn't this a young writer's society, and what do we use to write? Our voice, our ideas, our dreams, our pen.

And for all things written, words are not only words. So nothing is truely just literary.

We are both different people with different view points. So this is mine.

I love the way you went for a solid, controversial issue. All too often people think 'that's been done before,' and go and do something really vague and too 'out there' to touch the audience. However, I would say to them 'has it been done before, by you?'

It's ambitious, at any rate. The poetry in this piece just falls short of living up to the huge theme which cripples your ability throughout this. Think about it. Of course, you've been at least creative enough to play around with the concepts of days to an unborn child and how precious they are to it's young life, and you convey the cruelty well-but not well enough to make this outstanding, which I was expecting.

Don't think you can't do it. You can. You can really make something quite amazing out of this. I know it. Firstly:

1. Imagery- The 'foot' is good. Whether it's factually correct, from the other responses, I'm not sure, but you're on the right track. Make the imagery more vivid, make it real. Sympathy for writing is won in the littlest, rudest details. Go for it.

2. Research- You may or may not be very well learned in this topic. Even if you are, go and do some research. You'll be fired up for this afterwards, believe me.

3. Show, don't tell- Oh yes. I pulled that old ace of the reviewer. By this I mean be more discrete in your poetic voice. Why don't create some suspicion that makes the reader think 'who is this talking? what's happening?' and then have a great shiny big twist at the end. Yee-ha!

Hope this helps. I'd be very happy to follow your progress on this site, and please- do try and get the most out of YWS. It's amazingly good tonic for writer's block.

Luck,

Eimear.

I have to say, regardless of my personal stance on the subject--which, I agree, should not affect an objective criticism of the piece--this poem is not one of my favorites.

I do have to give you props, though, for actually attempting to do something new with this style of poem. I've read poems from the viewpoint of aborted fetuses before--mostly in chain emails--and yours stood apart from them. At first, at least, you didn't try to make a political statement. Until you did, I thought the poem, while not very well-developed as of yet, could be salvaged and made into something pretty darn good.

See, with this style of poetry, the danger is that the message will kill the poem. In other words, as a few of our less levelheaded companions above have reminded us, you turn it into an argument, instead of a work of art. I think if you hadn't included that pesky word "killed," this could've been pretty good. It would behoove you, I think, to revise this.

I actually do like how you used the days of the week, despite the fact that they're obviously not medically correct. Much thought about abortion is rooted in religion, and Christians often believe that the world was created in seven days. Most modern historians, of course, believe that that refers to not literal 24-hr-periods, but epochs--so why not use days here in the same way? The way you've used them, they're just symbols for a certain, unspecified length of time. And having it end on Sunday, of course, just emphasizes the religious undertones.

While the thought behind this is pretty good, I have a few bones to pick with your style. Eimear's already pointed out the biggest--and that is, a general lack of imagery. It's almost become trite now, with so many people repeating it, but the truth is--you need to show, and not tell.

Let's take Saturday as an example, yes?

Your version:

Saturday, I get lifted out

Of my Mother and killed.

There are obviously a few grammatical issues here--mother should not be capitalized, and "get lifted out" is just plain ugly phrasing--but most importantly, you're telling us, not showing. Try, perhaps, something more like:

Saturday, I rise out
and up, and my mother is hidden from me.

Before you only had a sense of movement; now there is a sense of movement and a sense of sight. Admittedly, your chosen format--couplets--doesn't leave much room for experimentation.

This is running to the long end, so, let's wrap it up. Try to retain the feeling without making a statement though the judicious use of imagery and word choice. Be aware of your grammatical choices, and don't be afraid to ask someone with better grammar to look it over, or to consult a guide. Also, keep your head down. Writing about such things is the equivalent of pasting a bulls-eye on your back.