The loner

Yeah, another one of my poems... enjoy. =]


He sat alone at home,
Each minute a painful wait,
The clock hand moving slowly,
Each tick lessening faith.

Every step a deathly struggle,
Each breath a driving force,
No one to help with the journey,
A life filled with remorse.

A glinting knife a warm invite,
His mind torn between two,
What was he more afraid of?
Death…or a life untrue?

Alone he lay on his bed,
His mind miles away,
A smile flickered on his face,
A thought of ending the day.

Slowly he forced himself up,
A smirk etched into his eyes
Laughter clear in his features,
Later… A boy who dies.

You know, that was really good. Simple prose works for you. There wasn't anything extremely deep or sybolic in there, but the flow was lovely. It's the perfect example of simple beauty. I think the length was nice, also. Keep writing poetry!

I agree, this piece is quite good.
I would recommend that everywhere in your poem a ... (ellipses, I believe they're called) appears, replace it/them with a comma. I find that a ... tends to denote a pause slightly too long, which breaks the rhythm.
Great work, though. Keep it up!

Hi mimimac,

mimimac wrote:He sat alone at home,
Each minute a painful wait,
The clock hand moving slowly,
Each tick lessening faith.

The pseudo-imagery that somewhat makes an appearance and then disappears is getting annoying already, and this is just the beginning of this poem, which isn't a good sign. What is a "painful wait"? Is the reader supposed to take your word for it without any backing? He should rightfully expect you to make him relate, to add description that embodies those two concepts and elaborates on why they were paired together?

While you did attempt a weak physical portrayal of the wait by the slow clock, that line is completely useless. A slow clock is essentially the same as an enduring wait. You didn't delve into it any further beyond explaining that slow=painful, something that the reader should associate anyway.

The last line similarly contains nothing that could make the reader understand. "Lessening" is a dry word and aches the throat in this context. Remove it and make the line fluid. Read it out loud if you must.

Every step a deathly struggle,
Each breath a driving force,
No one to help with the journey,
A life filled with remorse.

A glinting knife a warm invite,
His mind torn between two,
What was he more afraid of?
Death…or a life untrue?

This is mostly fluff and doesn't do anything to progress the poem. Granted, you expand on it a little by saying that he is contemplating suicide and is ashamed of his life, but you didn't need to drag that on in two stanzas, especially when those are the only ideas being contributed here. This is like taking two steps into a swimming pool instead of one. It's progress, but barely any. For starters, stop the preaching and don't tell the reader what this boy's thoughts are. Don't say that he was deciding on what he was more afraid of. Describe it. Show it.

Alone he lay on his bed,
His mind miles away,
A smile flickered on his face,
A thought of ending the day.

Slowly he forced himself up,
A smirk etched into his eyes
Laughter clear in his features,
Later… A boy who dies.

More nonsense. So...he decided to kill himself. Is that it? The rest of this is the same type of pseudo-imagery that I pointed out in the beginning; "laughter clear in his features" is a good example of this. Why be vague and say "features" instead of zooming in on what those features were exactly? All it does is put distance between the reader and the main character, and that is not good. Fix that and the other pseudo-imagery, such as "smile flickered" (which is actually also a cliche and should be removed entirely) and "a thought of ending the day".

After that, scrap this poem and begin something new. This doesn't say much and definitely doesn't present a relatable message. Think of an idea that more than one person (namely, more than the writer herself) will read and appreciate, and incorporate that into a future poem.

Hope that helped,
Galerius

ZOMG. You didn't.

*rereads*

Eek, you totally did.

I don't understand WHY young writers do this, but I've read literally dozens of poems like yours, so much so that it becomes rather comedic... but I don't think that is your aim. Anyway, these poems seem to follow this pattern:

1. Loneliness (which is not explained, completely random, passed off as craziness, etc.)
2. He sees a knife.
3. He dies.

And each time I read one of these poems, I keep on thinking, in a completely sarcastic tone, "Yeah. That's totally how it happens. Totally." Because, you know, people just laugh maniacally as they kill themselves because OBVIOUSLY they are crazy and OBVIOUSLY there is no reason for them killing themselves, etc., etc.

No wait... there is a reason, no?

Every step a deathly struggle,
Each breath a driving force,
No one to help with the journey,
A life filled with remorse.

I hate to say this but... everybody feels like this every once and a while. It's part of the crap that you have to deal with being human. It eventually passes after a while, usually without being accompanied by evil smirks and craziness. Honest.

Now, fortunately for you, young writers are allowed one crappy suicide poem like this in their writing career. I have one myself, in fact... I haven't gotten rid of it, but it is floating around there somewhere, and trust me, it's bad. However, if you want to write another suicide poem, you need to actually research suicide. It's some pretty frightening stuff, both for the people who would like to commit suicide and for the people trying to stop them. And trust me. There are always the people who are trying to stop them. Been there myself. It's not fun.

Also, the people who want to commit suicide... there are more reasons for them wanting to die than just loneliness and such. There are a lot more reasons.

And! Don't stop writing! Like I said, I think it's a prerequisite to write one of these poems before you get good, so now it's all downhill, no? Just... remember, research and then write. It'll make your stuff that much better.

I did quite enjoy this poem but i agree with Snoink above that a suicide poem is really rather cliche and usually follows a simple depressing pattern.
All i have to say really is write something different and more original and continue to improve.

"Every step a deathly struggle,Each breath a driving force,No one to help with the journey,A life filled with remorse.A glinting knife a warm invite," This is my favorite part of the poem, don't know why, guess it's just the most true and emotional. This overall was a very beautiful poem. i wouldn't call it a sucide poem eaither. just a poem about being stressed,depressed, and confused, and wanting all the pain to go away. everybody feels that way sometimes. I think it was very originall. the subject wasn't but they theme and way it was written was. anywoo i'll stop ranting and just say that i really enjoyed reading this poem and thought it was very interesting.