Is this not love?

Love is the spring that never runs dry,
Even when it's burning.
Love is the only truthful lie:
The one secret worth learning.
Love is a phoenix reborn from its ashes,
A singing nightingale batting its lashes.
Love is the tender war that leaves a blissful mess;
The more you give away the more you possess...

Hey Whispers! Love the username, by the way. And welcome to YWS! *throws confetti*

You have no idea how much I love short poems, dear. It means I can delve straight into them and decipher every line. My first suggestion, however, is to un-capitalize your title. It's rather distracting, and surely unnecessary. You want your poem's amazingness to speak for itself, without our eyes being drawn to it because you put the title in Caps.

Love is the spring that never runs dry,
Even when it's burning.

I love this first sentence. When I read the burning part, I had to scratch my head a bit, but it's a proper metaphor once you understand it. Love doesn't end just because it hurts.

Love is the only truthful lie:
The only secret worth learning.

Here, my only issue is your repetition of the word 'only' in both lines. Out of the whole English language, surely there's another word out there you could substitute for one of these? For the second line, you could rephrase it as:

The one secret that is worth learning

This works because of your loose rhythmic scheme. Even though you have such a nice, concrete rhyme going, you have managed not to back yourself in a corner by establishing un unavoidable rhythm. See what I mean? You can tweak the syllables, and still have the poem's flow work perfectly.

Love is a phoenix reborn from [s]it's[/s] [its] ashes;
A singing nightingale batting it's [its] lashes.

It's = It is. You want the possesive form, which would be 'its'.

Love is the tender war that leaves a blissful mess;
The more you give away [comma here] the more you possess...

I suggest just ending the poem in a full stop. While the ellipses (the ...) can add dramatic effect or whatnot, you give your poem a sense of finality by putting a period at the end. Okay?

OMG! This is really good! We'll have to watch out for you, eh? I liked how simple this was, yet you still managed to include some nice imagery and metaphors without making it super deep and/or indecipherable. It's a different take on a common subject, and although we can tell that the author has had some bitter experiences with love, they aren't writing angrily or with frustration. It's very...mellow. Calm. Like, drifting on a cloud, watching people fall in and out of love below you and just observing.



Now, you did have a punctuation issue in line number 5. That semi-colon at the end should just be a regular old comma, methinks. For a semi-colon, you have to have two complete thoughts on both sides, but line 6 doesn't have a verb. However! That's easy to fix.

Good luck with your writing, dear, and I hope to see you around, posting!

~Evi

Wow, those spelling mistakes are absolutely shameful, i think that's my cue to go to bed!! I'm glad you enjoyed this, the punctuation of the last verse is a choice both for the comma and the suspension dots (that is I believe the official grammatical terminology!): I wanted the shape of the poem to reflect this never-ending cycle of boundless love: there is no finality to love, so none to the poem!
I very much like your interpretation of the first couple of verses, I hadn't quite considered it that way!
xx

Hey there! First off, welcome to YWS. Comments are in bold, 'kay?

Velvet.whispers wrote:Love is the spring that never runs dry, I think it'd have more of an effect if Love was italicized. That said, it's still a fantastic opening.
Even when it's burning. Oh, my God. This is the absolutely perfect metaphor. Love is heat, passion. It burns through you and it hurts, but it's like an eternal candle. True love never ends.
Love is the only truthful lie:
The only secret worth learning. I agree with Evi. The repetition of only here is a little amateur-ish. Find a different word. The only one I can think of is the French equivalent (seulement), but it wouldn't fit. xD
Love is a phoenix reborn from it's ashes; I like how you keep with the fire theme; the burning in the second line and the ashes here. Great extended metaphor.
A singing nightingale batting its lashes.
Love is the tender war that leaves a blissful mess;
The more you give away, the more you possess... Again, I agree with Evi. A full stop would have more effect.

Wow! You are a wonderful writer. I absolutely love when people can say a lot in a small amount of words. You capture the true essence of what love is. This really spoke to me in a way that's beyond words. It touched my heart. It brought tears to my eyes. Gold star for you.

Hi, Whispers! Music here.

Love is the spring that never runs dry,
Even when it's burning.
Love is the only truthful lie:
The one secret worth learning. I love this line. Heck, I loved all of the lines, but this was perfect.
Love is a phoenix reborn from its ashes,
A singing nightingale batting its lashes.
Love is the tender war that leaves a blissful mess;
The more you give away, the more you possess... Wonderful poem!

You, my darling, have talent! An excellent poet, I must say. I loved every line of this.

Your use of descriptive language really drew the reader in. Nice use of metaphors!

As it's been mentioned, the ending would be more absolute and solid if you replaced the "..." with a period. It would end the poem simply yet effectively.

Also, as Evi noted, I'm a sucker for short poems. They're small, quick, and to the point. Very decisive. This poem was a great example of a good short poem.

Your use of words was nice; they weren't too complicated, but they weren't simple. This is important when appealing to readers of your works.

I'm keeping an eye on you, my dear. You have potential to be great. Greater, I should say.

Love,
Music.

Velvet.whispers wrote:Love is the spring that never runs dry,
Even when it's burning.

OK....
This kinda doesn't make sense, as "spring" usually means a stream of water, and water doesn't burn!!!
Other than that, it's really good-liking the antonyms.

Velvet.whispers wrote:Love is the spring that never runs dry,
Even when it's burning.
Love is the only truthful lie:
The one secret worth learning.
Love is a phoenix reborn from its ashes, This line kind of ruins the rhythm, maybe Love is a phoenix born from its ashes
A singing nightingale batting its lashes. Birds don't have eyelashes do they? So this is confusing, maybe use a different animal, like A singing 'Cat?' batting its lashes or maybe rule out singing and use a different verb?
Love is the tender war that leaves a blissful mess;
The more you give away the more you possess...

I think it is very well written, the rhyming is excellent, but there are some things you need to work on. This is just my opinion.

To Pgsgirl7 and iCarlyfan, read Keats and you'll understand that anglophone poetry is not about reality or what "makes sense", but about what manages to create a mental image, an evocation, a sudden understanding, precisely through the association of words that don't make sense!!!

*clicks star*

*also clicks star*

*same here*

I thought this poem really does tell what love really is like.

I loved this! There was great imagery. I could see it all. You had a great use of metaphors and similes. It was very true to who love is at times. Great Job. This has potential. In my opinion you could even make this a little longer. Again, it was great. I did not see to many mistakes. It deserves a gold star. (clicks gold star)

this is adorable.
only problem i have is that it confuses me when someone doesnt use the same constant rhyme scheme throughout a poem (with the exception of free verse, which your poem here is not.) e.g. how you went ABABCCDD. try moving some lines around and rewording a few things so that the rhyme scheme is all clean and neat and the same.

Thanks to all for the reviews and gold stars!!
I have to say I'm rather surprised that this seems to be what has been most appreciated among everything that I've posted, because it really is one of my less original works.
As for little_miss_obsessed, i really couldn't homogenise the rhyming scheme, or this would really become much too traditional for me to claim it's authorship!

this is adorable.

Could you possibly find anything to say that's any more condescending?!
Love,
Velvet