17

"17"

Words waver,
Then decrease in value.
Once thought to be a concrete foundation,
These promises have become insubstantial.

The future is ever distant:
A dead man’s mirage
In the desert of repetition.

Forced to evolve,
Dreams of the past begin to unfold,
As fragile as the skin of a bat wing-
Stretched taut-
Now tearing.
Exposure is accompanied by Humiliation,
Emergence by Shattered Confidence.

Timidly place faith in this new imagery-
Rebirthing-
Both glorious and painful.
Future hopes unfolding
As fragile as the silk of a butterfly wing.
Escape this suffocation cocoon,
The instrument of your metamorphosis.

Stand and stretch these damp, new wings;
Appreciate the grind of sand stone;
Celebrate the shattered pieces,
And the opportunity to rearrange.

Feels good to hurt like this-
Dismantle and recreate me.

Hello there!

This is me being more nitpicky that I should but I think you should take "A Coming of Age Poem" out of your thread title. It ruins the reader interpretation part of poetry. You tell me it's about coming of age, rather than allowing me to read your poem and discover myself the meaning and connections. Without reader interpretation, where is any of the fun?

I absolutely adored your use of bat and butterfly wings to express the think or gentle teenage skin when breaking. Butterflies as a metamorphosing thing is cliché but you did well enough that I don't think I need complain. You took it in a different direction, and next to the bat wing it is an apt comparison.

I had a bit of a problem with your grammar and punctuation, particularly towards the beginning. It seemed off in places and I would very much like to go through and repunctuate the whole thing, but rather than doing that and invading your poetical space, I'm merely going to let you know that I didn't like it. In some places you used commas where I thought it should have been a semicolon or a colon (second stanza for example). Some places you have no commas at all when I feel there should be a pause, if not for the sake of being grammatically correct, to allow the sentence to flow properly. Many, many people cry foul when you start to mention punctuation and grammar in poetry, as if that is such an unheard of thing, but hopefully you'll understand the use of it. I thought some of your line breaks (particularly the very first) did a disadvantage to the poem because the thoughts you left on a line were too empty on there own, and would work better if remade.

I particularly loved your bat-wing stanza because the tearing was so vivid and it gave life to the usual mundane teenage complaints. I also loved the "suffocation cocoon"; that does a lovely job of explaining more teenage things in a unique way.

Soul morphing,
Colors unraveling,
Stand and stretch these damp, new wings.

Feels good to hurt like this-
Break me down and recreate me.

Among these two stanzas the only line I felt that really added anything to the poem was "feels good to hurt like this", and I think it should be placed closer to a stanza that actually talks about the tearing, the ripping, the pain so that "this" doesn't become so vague and meaningless within the poem. All the other lines seemed pointless and didn't add anything to the poem. The first stanza is generic butterfly, changing poetry. I think you could write something that is strong and that add to the overall message/appeal of your poem, rather than weighing it down in cliché. The last line of your poem seemed to informal and a lot more, dare I say, emo. The line before it was so strong, and to end on a weaker line like that ruined the poems ending, IMHO.

Overall it wasn't a bad poem, redeemed by its unique imagery and different way of putting things together, but I think it could be a lot better if you addressed the problems I mentioned above. Best of luck!

You did okay, but this could use a-lot of revising. I like how you compared the 17th year like a butterfly starting as a caterpillar as a baby then going from a cacoon to a butterfly. Beautifully written just take stanza out.

Feels good to hurt like this-

Break me down and recreate me.

This sounds like a young adult jumping to death and being reborn again. This just dosen't sound right unless you were trying to express something else you really need to rewrite it.

Hey there,

I thought the first stanza was the most powerful. It really expressed the loss of innocence to me.

I think for clarifications sake, there needs to be a little more information between stanza three and stanza four. A stanza Three and 3/4. This is because the jump in perspective is a little abrupt, and as such, is hard to notice with a mind of understanding. How did Faith get there? Is the information I believe is lacking.
I like the contrast between the stretched and broken batwing and the even more fragile butterfly wing. How terrifying to enter the world weaker and yet, somehow, in a way so hard to grasp – stronger! To think of the bravery to climb out of the dank yet cloyingly comfortable nest of false security.
To come to a place that understands pain as a crown, failure as an opportunity, burden as a chance to know how good the one who provides really is.

Here’s to the pain of rebirth,
-M.

I can totally relate to this poem, Haha.

These kind of teenager angst/growing up poems are kind of over done and to be honest when I first saw the title of this poem I was cringing in horror at the way my cliche 17 year old feelings were going to be butchered and cut to pieces. BUT the way that you expressed this poem was very, very refreshing. It expressed all of the emotion underneath all of the teenage drama.

I love the first stanza as well as the second, together they just click with me really well.

The third stanza is cool, love the bat imagery. And I think that it is so true, when your seventeen you realize that all those little dreams you had in the past are just dreams and nothing like reality. I don't know if that's what you intended it to mean but that's how I interpreted it.

I totally agree with Mandorelute, on that the third and fourth stanzas do not click together. Its like all of the sudden there is a new scenery with new hopes and there was no birth of it. It just jolts you out of the poem and the feelings.

I think that maybe the first sentence in the fourth stanza could be rearranged. Maybe replacing that this with a the, making it:

{Timidly place faith in the new imagery-
Rebirthing-
Both glorious and painful.}

or maybe even replacing the this with an a?

{Timidly place faith in a new imagery-
Rebirthing-
Both glorious and painful.}

Make it like your coming into the new imagery after all the crushed dreams and all the hurt instead of just being in it. Does that make sense?

I don't know just a suggestion.

Now the next two stanza's end it perfectly. It's not easy to change and let go of your past. Yes its a fresh start and a new look at life, and you grow into being a better person. But starting a new stage in life is gritty and it hurts. Yet, you still get to grow into a new version of yourself and that is nice. You express that nicely, I think.

Anyway, hope you understood half of what I was trying to say in this review. I know my critiques are lame and don't make sense but I'm trying and I was never very good at this.

M.:

Thank you for your honest review!

I see what you mean about the third and fourth stanzas clashing- it is a complete change in direction. In fact, now that I think about it, most of my poems are like that. I begin discouraged and end on an optimistic note, as if halfway through I change my mind and decide things aren't that bad after all. Ha, ha. Hey, poetry is therapy...

Thanks for pointing this out so I can work on my transitions in the future!!


wearebright:

It is good to hear that someone is connecting with my piece as intended. And no, you do not suck at this. Your review was rather encouraging... besides, every writer needs to know how their work will be received even more than they need an editor to point out mechanical errors. You did a fantastic job of it. So thank you.






Here's to everyone else who reviewed my piece:
A big warm thank you very much.

PEACE,
BAB

Hi! I know you already replied to some critiques on this, but I thought I would mention a couple of things...

First, I'm not sure I agree with the assessment of this poem as emo or cliched...it seems like it ought to be, given the butterfly metaphor, but I felt like you took that metaphor to a different place by putting faith into the mix. This isn't so much a meditation on the process of growing up as it is an encouragement, a reassurance--it's reflected outward, not inward. I think in that context, and given the beautiful and original language you use, the butterfly works.

As for the transition between stanzas 3 and 4, I have to disagree with the others on this one. I think that break is just what you need, that sense of stepping from shadow into sunlight, from doubt into hope (only less corny than that ). This poem, it seems to me, directs itself outward--it's a reassurance to the self, but also a message to those still struggling behind.

Now for the in-text comments...

Words waver,
Then decrease in value.
Once thought to be a concrete foundation,
These promises have become insubstantial.

A good beginning. The "decrease in value" might feel stilted or out of place to some, but I find it oddly powerful--it's a very adolescent view of the world, this value judgment, and the doubts add to that sense of youth and vulnerability.

The future is ever distant:
A dead man’s mirage
In the desert of repetition.

I have to say, I'm not sure what you're saying here. The first line is lovely and resonant, but the following image confuses me. The desert of repetition makes sense enough if I think about it, though I'm not sure it quite gets to the right side of cliche, but the dead man's mirage? I'm lost.

Exposure is accompanied by Humiliation,
Emergence by Shattered Confidence.

That "is accompanied by" feels stilted to me...it could just be the passive voice, but I think you could do with a more creative verb there. Meets? Brings? Something along those lines. I also can't say I'm wild about the capitalizations here...can you really justify those? I felt a little hit over the head with it. This was one of the few points where I found the poem got a little too emo for me.

Feels good to hurt like this-
Dismantle and recreate me.

This stanza was another of those points. I think it was partly the omission of the "it" at the beginning, but I also just feel like the imagery is a let-down after the rest of the poem. You've established that the pain of growing up is a transition to something better; why reduce it to feeling pleasure in the pain itself? Is that really what you mean to say (in which case, please do ignore me), or was this line just written impulsively? I just don't feel like it jives with the rest of the poem.

Sorry if I'm jumping on the bandwagon a little late and you've already started revising...I just thought this was interesting!

Keep writing!