Fanleaf

A disease of grapevines: soiled, spoiled Rotten,
Rotted garden: green waxed Brown
Muddy earth: weeds grow Anyway
Have you heard of: Fanleaf: decayed Vines
Climb damn near anything: fences, walls and People
Have no idea: ever seen that Look
They’re confused: can’t blame ‘em, it’s like Cacophony
But silent: plants don’t speak out loud ya Know
That even their bows aren’t really obeisant: Unintentional
Shapes, angles: the living follow the Sun
Reaches to earth: the roots reach Back
Down through its soil: finds water to Drink
If it’s needed: there’s more for Later
Is better than never: time to Quit.


New one for me. Hope y'all like

Hello Vivela!

First things first, why do you capitalize the last word of every line? It's really distracting and it seems unnecessary!

Okay, now for the poem itself!

I kind of don't like that you told us upfront that it was a disease of grapevines, just because and then you kept mentioning it over and over again. For instance:

A disease of grapevines: soiled, spoiled Rotten,

Then:

Have you heard of: Fanleaf: decayed Vines

Stop repeating yourself! And I realize you want the tough, sort of slang sound to your poem (which why you are attempting to use slang, such as "'em" and "ya know"), so you want the upfront, in your face feel, but still! It may be better to just describe how the grapevines are decaying, first with that characteristic yellow waxy look that succumbs to the brown as time passes and the virus spreads. That way, instead of repeating yourself, you present the cold truth upfront, which seems more tough and gritty to me anyway... which is what you want. Speaking of virus... if anything, I would use that term rather than "disease" simply because it's a lot more specific, and we love the concrete and specific in poetry!

Next, it looks like you're trying to tie this poem in with something more meaningful, but it's not really coming across at all since you seem so intent about talking about the disease that you forget the point. What are you trying to say? Your last image isn't very strong. (Time to quit what? Can plants even quit?) So you need to present a more striking image that corresponds both to humanity AND plants to be powerful.

Good luck with your poem!

Snoink: Thanks for reading! But to reply to your comments:

1. I capitalized the last word of every line because I was trying to have the last word work as both the end of the line and the beginning of the next line. Hmm, I'm not sure that explanation makes sense... what I mean is, for example:

Have no idea: ever seen that Look
They’re confused: can’t blame ‘em, it’s like Cacophony

Here it would be, "ever seen that look?/ Look, they're confused"

2. Fair enough. I can see how the repetition is distracting and unnecessary.

3. To be truthful, I'm not even sure if I had a point, or some sort of message to demonstrate. But the way I wrote it definitely seems to suggest that there's something else there, so I definitely see what you mean.

Thanks again!

If you want the last word of each line to be the beginning of the next, you should probably punctuate it as such. After all, punctuation in poetry is just like in prose. If you were to write this out into paragraph form, you would add the proper commas and periods where necessary and you wouldn't capitalise random words unless they were following said periods. Understand? And quite honestly, I stopped reading your poem after the fourth or fifth line, because I was so confused as to what you were trying to say.

My suggestion to you? Understand your topic before you write about it. Otherwise it will come out as a jumbled mess.