On My Cinderella Knees

I think I'm going to
ram my fingernails
into the back of my hand.

With matching charcoal minds
we find we can't converse
unless through loaded shouts.

Mop mop mopped
a spill I didn't make,
teary pool of orange drink,

on my Cinderella knees,
with repressed
sparks in my eyes.

And I'm sitting on a minefield
waiting for the step that kills,
waiting for the fragment-rain

to wash the ground with skin
and we're pressed so tightly in here
that there's not one draft of air.

I think I'd try to breathe if there
was more to breathe than smoke.

Hello Jasmine!

Well I thought this was a wonderful poem. It reads easily, I didn't have to go over it or anything to understand it. What I got out of it mostly was restlessness and a feeling dissatisfied with life. The speaker's life, that is. The imagery is great, I especially love the title, and this line:

and repressed sparks in my eyes.

Very good. The poem has a very vivid ring to it, I can actually see a young girl looking at her own hand, thinking about ramming her fingernails into her skin. It's brilliant.

The poem progresses well, and toward the end I started to get a feel for the trenches, I'm sure it probably wasn't the intention, but it was a great metaphor for waiting in an enclosed space, sorry if my interpretation comes out jumbled here, I'm just rambling. This was amazing:

And I'm sitting on a minefield

waiting for the step that kills,

Very subtle yet devastatingly effective.

The ending is just superb. Please PM me when you post more, I remember another poem of yours, was it cherry blossom petals? It was great too.

Eimear

Haha, I totally did not procrastinate on critiquing this poem because I was playing Pokemon obsessively... really. XD

Well... okay, so I was actually editing FREAK, but still. Your poem was strange. I ranted and raved about it, tried to write several critiques, failed miserably, and so I just made a video of me reading your poem and wondering at it. There's lots of flailing, so I hope you don't mind.

I hope your computer likes youtube (edit: er... or revver):

http://revver.com/video/1279842/affilia ... lla-knees/

Okay! So you can't see the video thing. Aww....

That means I'll just go line by line. Less flailing but... maybe that's better?



I think I'm going to

ram my fingernails

into the back of my hand. <-- I like the violence in this stanza. It's like BOOM. I AM VIOLENT! Of course, there's a catch! As soon as you write this, we wonder why this image is shown. Why is she ramming her fingernails in the back of her hand? Why does she want to? So this is a pretty good catch, as far as the poem goes, and makes it so that we're wondering why she wishes to hurt herself.



The flames are licking

at my heart and it

was already curled and bruised. <-- ZOMG. This is emo crap! Delete it! And I know why you're using the flames stuff. It's because you want to connect Cinderella with this girl and then have the flames bask her heart, whatever. But really, this sounds so horribly cliched emo that it's better not seeing the light of day.



Mop mop mopped <-- I like this line because it ties in with the Cinderella imagery without being painfully obvious.

a spill I didn't make <-- This isn't strong enough imagery. What is this spill? Maybe by describing it more, then it'll be better. But still.

with my Cinderella knees <-- This makes it seem like she's cleaning up the spill with her knees. A funny image, but I don't think it works.



and repressed sparks in my eyes. <-- Hmm.



And I'm sitting on a minefield

waiting for the step that kills,

waiting for the fragment-rain

to wash the ground with skin

and we're pressed so tightly in here

that there's not one draft of air. <-- This part is LOVELY. I mean, LOVELY. I mean, the other stuff has potential and everything, but this is the part that floors the reader and makes them thing, "ZOMG. THIS POEM IS AWESOME." And it is because of all the vivid imagery and stuff. There seem to be two parts of the poem... the Cinderella part and the war part. The Cinderella part seems awkward and amateur while this stuff seems to be professional. And it shines So right now, the Cinderella part doesn't seem to fit.


I think I'd try to breathe if there

was more to breathe than smoke. <-- And a lovely conclusion!

So! I would suggest getting rid of the first couple of stanzas. I like the war part immensely better than the Cinderella part. The Cinderella part seems much too... emo and angsty, especially right next to the war part, so delete it! You're a much better writer than that.

But I do like the Cinderella idea... not necessarily the way you portrayed it, but rather just the idea. You already have the Cinderella part in the title, so don't worry too much about making it more obvious. For a careful reader, it'll be just fine. Instead, what you might do is looking at the spill thing again and tie it in with the battlefield idea more. Maybe, for instance, she's surrounded by blood and she is trying desperately to wipe it all up, to no avail?

Keep the first stanza, but change the next three stanzas to tie in the imagery of the war. What if the flames were licking at the sky? So that would give the sky a fiery image. And then you can describe the ash falling down like rain (hey, it happens) so then it would give the setting a battle torn, ashy look. And that would be much more powerful than what you have.

Good luck!

Jasmine Hart wrote:I think I'm going to
ram my fingernails
into the back of my hand.

With matching charcoal minds
we find we can't converse
unless through loaded shouts.

Mop mop mopped
a spill I didn't make,
teary pool of orange drink,

on my Cinderella knees,
with repressed
sparks in my eyes.

And I'm sitting on a minefield
waiting for the step that kills,
waiting for the fragment-rain

to wash the ground with skin
and we're pressed so tightly in here
that there's not one draft of air.

I think I'd try to breathe if there
was more to breathe than smoke.

I was initially curious by the title, which drew me in. I like the descriptive language used throughout, and how you show rather than tell. The third stanza confused me, as did the end of the poem. This is definitely melancholy contemplation, but maybe I'm just not as profound at the moment to understand what the poem is trying to reveal.