Faith

I wrote this a while ago, but I kept forgetting to post it.

Faith
Faith builds strong homes,
Strong families,
strong friends.

When a souls last song is sung,
Faith keeps warm tears off of cheeks;
Knowing there is a better place.

With one faith comes another,
Then another more,
And over them we quarrel,
Until we can quarrel, no more.

As the bloody tears of battle,
Fall upon our soldiers,
Attempting to obscure the war,
My faith resides within myself,
My home,
My family,
My friends.

Hello! I haven't done a critique in a bajillion years, so sorry! I'm a little rusty. If I end up being too soft or hard, I swear, it's not because I want to be. ^_^;;

Anyway! Your poem!

I love delving into the nature of faith, so I was attracted to your poem. Here are my comments, line by line.


Faith builds strong homes,

Strong families,

strong friends.<-- When I read this stanza, I felt kind of "so what?" about it. Wait.. that sounds mean. Sorry! Let me see... okay, so when I read poetry and stuff, I like to have imagery just SLAP me in the face with its meaning and power of words. You're just stating that faith builds up strong homes, families, and friends. All right. Fine. It's not really a good hook, but I figured that maybe it was going somewhere. So the next thing you need to do is SLAP us with the power of words and awesomeness.



When a souls last song is sung, <-- soul's

Faith keeps warm tears off of cheeks; <-- get rid of "of" and the semicolon.

Knowing there is a better place. <--Hehe... so this is my own personal opinion and stuff, but lately I've been crying over the dead, and I do believe in Christ and such... it's just... it's hard. So I sort of want to see you put more conflict into this line. Tears do happen.


With one faith comes another,<-- Another what?

Then another more,<--Again, same question.

And over them we quarrel,<--I think you're referring to religions? Faith is different from religion, and you have to be specific.

Until we can quarrel, no more. <-- Get rid of the comma.



As the bloody tears of battle,

Fall upon our soldiers,

Attempting to obscure the war,

My faith resides within myself,

My home,

My family,

My friends.<--The ending doesn't seem powerful enough. You have this image of bloody tears falling upon soldiers (crazy image by the way... I slightly love it. It's like God is crying tears and the world is covered in red) and then you end with a simple restatement of your introduction without telling us why your faith resides with yourself, your home, your family, and your friends? Nuh uh!

So yeah! Try to be more crazy with what you say. Right now, it's like you're trying to list it out, but you have crazy awesome imagery in you, so just let it all flow out. It's in you... really! You just need to unlock it.

Good luck!

Snoink is right - you should try to add a little more power to you poem. It's a really great poem, the concept is awesome, however, you really shouldn't be afraid to just totally get out there - after all, being a writer is like being in control of your own personal insane asylum, right? I think that's a quote from some guy or other, I forget who, and can't remember where I read it... anywho!

Sorry, this isn't really much of a review, but I LOVED your poem - the concept was what attracted me to it, like Snoink.

See ya around!

~Claery