Aphrodite De Melos

Ancient statues standing tall,
noble visage, broken all,
they've stood for near a thousand years,
they'll probably stand a thousand more.
They watch us live,
they watch us die,
all the while in silence.
What they know they never say,
what they see they never tell,
the secrets lie, hidden away.
Collecting dust
of centuries gone by,
gathering rust,
we never know why,
The end of times will see them die.

This is good, but the rhyming is kind of confusing. You start out with rhyming, then stop, then start again at the end. I don't know if it's supposed to mean anything but try sticking to either rhyming or not.

keep it up
~guitargirl~

Hey God!

Before I start the critique, I must point out that stone cannot rust, and therefore, that line is irrelevant.

What is the point of this poem? Your just talking about statues standing there. Okay, I get that. Maybe you should have something happen before their eyes that people so want to know and understand, but can never see through the stone statue's eyes. Something like that. Make it a story, not just explaining that the statues are just going to be sitting there..And sitting there.. It causes a poem to get old.

As guitargrl stated, your rhyming is way off. If you are going to start a rhyme, then stick with it all the way through, don't just let it drop. Also, your syllables are all messed up. If you are going to rhyme, you have to have a good rhythm in it too. Choose a specific number of syllables that you want for every other line or so, and go with that.

Pm me if you have any questions.

*Princess*

I've come to find that I have all but fallen in love with the way you write. I think that poetry should express how the author feels, and it shouldn't matter whether it has a certain rhyme scheme or not. The imagery used in this was so real, and definitely gave Venus de Milo justice.
My personal favorite:

noble visage, broken all,

Something so beautiful and proud being defeated by something as simple as time... It's so heartbreaking!
Yeah, so I have no nit-picks. *sigh*
That's no fun. Ah well.
*Gold star*


*anti-pop

This was really good.

And I think that the event Princess was talking about that should have been there, being watched by the statues, is there. All summarized, it is civilization, existence, life itself, unfolding before the unmoving statues. Er, I don't have a problem with your rhythm, it flowed well anyway.

Anyway, more importantly, I really like this poem's concept. An passive thing watching the changes of the world. It's really an interesting idea and can be related to a lot of things in the world. To people, to nations, to races, to ideas, even to art. So for that, this poem is beautiful. Well, that is what I understood in this poem.

That's the thing I've noticed with your poetry, there are always significant meanings in them. Keep writing.

God wrote:Ancient statues standing tall,
noble visage, broken all,
they've stood for near a thousand years,
they'll probably stand for a thousand more. one too many syllables
They watch us live,
they watch us die,
all the while in silence.
What they know they never say,
what they see they never tell,
the secrets lie, hidden away.
Collecting dust
of centuries gone by,
gathering rust,
we never know why,
The end of times will see them die. are you talking about the secrets dying or the statues?

You know, one of my only problems with this is how maddeningly frustrating this is for me. Like, it's about statues. I get that. But everything about it echoes something deeper. I'm not good at deciphering deepness!

But don't let my inability to find the meaning of your poem make you think I don't like it. I do. It's very good. I second the opinion of someone else who reviewed this, though; marble statues, or statues of stone: they don't rust. So, unless you're talking about the secrets rusting, that doesn't work.

As for the rhyming: it's confusing. If your going to rhyme the first two lines and the last two, go ahead. But you rhyme 'dust' and 'rust' right before 'by', 'why', and 'die'. Make up your mind on your scheme, and it will seem better thought out, I assure you.

Kudos for testing my aptitude at deciphering hidden meanings and making me aware that this aptitude is nonexistant. Good luck with your writing, and good job!

~Evi

Hey there! June here .


I often tell myself to review your stuff. I go to your profile, read it, and walk away from it half annoyed that you just glued something to my brain. Gah. You and your... whatever-you-call-it. Intellect?

Anyway! Onto the review (and no, I am not going to play with grammar, structure, nor punctuation here) :

Your opening line pulled me in . It didn't just lure me in, it like, dragged me in, and you held my interest 'til the very last line. Like KnightlyAngel pointed out, your poems always have significant meanings to them, even if they aren't understood right away.

The usage of rust here is perfect. Sure, there are people who are going to argue with me on that point, but you can't just look at it on the surface. Sure, rust comes with corroding, but it doesn't just mean to literally "rust" and such. I can't exactly put the point I am trying to make here to words, but I don't think you should change it. Keep it; it's not only helping your rhyme, but it's adding something that makes you think. If one doesn't think (and, I don't mean think shallow-ly) about it, then they won't understand the meaning of it.





Also! This is not an easy poem to understand, dear. It took a lot of reading over for me to understand this. Which is good; poems that are too flat and describe everything to me like a story bore me sometimes. But, from the title, you're not just talking about any random statue, correct? More commonly, people refer to the statue mentioned in the title as Venus de Milo, so by not using its common name, you're just giving us another reason to scratch our heads . Good job .

At first, I wondered why you didn't touch on the history of the statue-- like, where it came from. But, everything needed to understand that lies in your words; it just takes a proper functioning mind to understand that .

The sculpture in the title is (if I recall properly) somewhat mysterious; so by using that name in your poem, you're giving us a lot here. You're somehow whispering to us that something that mankind longs to know the history of has seen the history that man yearns to know, while at the same time, witnessing his own history. (I totally hope that made sense! )

Your closing line is perfect. It finalizes everything, bringing us to the resolution in such a powerful manner-- the line can standalone on its own. I don't think any other line could take its place .

If you can't tell from my confusing rant, I really enjoyed this. You really made me think on this one. I love how you secretly touched on history in this; amazing job my friend. Gold star for you.

And! I hope I didn't confuse you too much . Sorry if I did!

June

Keep it up!

Hey there!
I am a big supporter of authors using rhyme scheme and overall structure however they want to, becuase that is the point of poetry. However, I was a little thrown off by the seemingly random (I say that because I do not know what you were thinking when you wrote it) lines that did rhyme. It made it difficult for me to read the poem with a flow. I was very interested in the topic of the poem. I love the idea of the statues watching over everyone, seeing what happens to them through their lives and continuing to do so over time. Very creative subject!

thank you all, for your support, I found your reviews most helpful,

might I point out, princess, that I never claimed the statues were stone, it might have been iplied, but statues were made of many things, such as bronze, which very well can rust.

anyhow, thanks all,

Peace,
God