Hear the Doldrums

Running pale little fingers through
flaming red hair, it made his day
knowing she was there.
Clutching his shoulders,
those cocoa eyes sigh.
They’re posing for pictures,
wasting perfect time.

Hear doldrums when we lose someone,
pure pain to think of them,
but pretending it never happened,
won’t quite help anyone.
Feeling lost without him,
nothing's right in this silence, because
a great teddy bear, and a best friend
Is now gone.

Now the rain falls harder,
and hearts run a little faster.
A question is asked, so she
smiles with more laughter.
Inside it’s manslaughter,
can’t figure it out.
She's lost.
So lost, ‘cause he’s gone.

Now there's jokes, as she plays
all the friendly little games,
that feel oh-so harmless, but
hurt just the same, as it does
when she sees
that picture on the wall
of that Saturday in the park,
on his shoulders, ten feet tall.

Still see his gleaming smile, and
still hear his hearty laugh.
It’s not quite right,
Being so stuck in the past.
While they recite and repeat:
“Just remember he loved you.
Remember I love you.
Don’t forget he loves you.”
Wherever he’s gone.

Hey there,

I liked this, but it seemed to personal to be expressed as "you" all the time. it seemed too general. I think it would be stronger written in first person.

Also, you might want to think about changing the first line. "It's sad when you lose someone"... well, yeah, but losing someone is much more than sad. Try starting out with a bang. I suggest moving stanza 4 to the very beginning and moving the word "through" to the next line. just a thought, though. Enjoy editing!

Hey there Singing!
I'm JustDance, call me JD.
I'm here to review this piece of yours! Hope I help!

But pretending it never happened

Comma!

You feel lost without them,
Nothing’s right, without him.
A big teddy bear, and your best friend
Is gone.

You went from 'them' to 'him'. That might confuse the readers if you're talking to them and relating, or just talking to them about something only about you. I'm not very fond with the last two lines, maybe "is now gone" with more wording. The teddy bear adds a sense of innocence, top that off with the last line.

Smile with more laughter.
Inside it’s manslaughter,
You can’t figure it out.

Love! Love! Love!

Soaring, ten feet tall.

This is slightly confusing. Park? Soaring?

Just remember he loved you,
Remember I love you,
Don’t forget he loves you,
Wherever he’s gone.

This makes me think this is for someone who lost a loved one, and you care about the person who lost that loved one, as if you love them. Am I correct or wrong?

Overall --
It was very lovely. You had a few punctuation mistakes, but I liked it. A bit bland in some areas, but it did speak to me. Keep on writing!
-JD

Hi, I'm Grin

Okay. Looking at this, I'm wondering if you meant to put it into Lyrics? It sort of has a song-feel to it. But as it's here, onwards with the critique.

This obviously has a heartfelt background to it, and it is well-written and significant to everyday life. Your only problem is letting your emotions out onto the paper. This is a common struggle for poets: the feeling is there, but pens don't feel emotion and it's hard to get it out.

We all know the feeling and your audience will sympathise. But they won't empathise, because even if they've been through the same thing, they'll just struggle to feel what you, the poet, are trying to put forward.

It would help your piece to get rid of most, if not all, of the punctuation. I think it might help the flow of it, the words seem sort of separated at the moment and the reader automatically breaks it down into those clauses.

You seem to be changing between "you", "I", "they" and "him" which is a little confusing. Maybe you could try to keep it to one personal reference. "He" is more appropriate than "they", and I think as you're referring to him in the third person, it would be better to avoid switching to "you". "I" is much better.

I did like this, though. You have a good start here, and after some work it will be great.

Hope that helped
~Grin

Hello!

I won't do a bit by bit critique here, but I'm just going to say that I thought you had a reasonable idea behind this, but I think you need to better execute it. Your narration is fair; I'm having trouble fully appreciating it because it sounds incomplete and almost fragmented with your enjambment, dear. Instead of beginning every new line with a capital letter, why not focus on making it all fluent? Capital letters are like punctuation; where you place them determines how your audience will read over a part of your writing.

I like that you carry a simplistic wording throughout this, because it makes it very easy for your audience to understand what you're saying. I also think your poem could be improved if you added imagery -- a few things like instead of saying eyes shine, parallelling this to the sunlight, or something exciting like that (and that was just a random example that came to mind).

The problem with the "you" message in poetry is that it's pressing what we're supposed to feel on us. See, poetry is mostly a matter of interpretation and creativity and you know, in using the "you" message, it's a little difficult to interpret for ourselves. I'd lessen that a bit.

Overall, it's not bad -- not terribly original, but not bad. Keep writing.

June

Hey singingsaturdays!

One of the things that struck me about this poem was the lack of story, which is a bit odd seeing as you posted this in Narrative Poetry. Narrative poetry usually has some sort of story attached with it while this poem generally only contains a couple of snapshots of instances you had when you were together. So a bit odd!

Now, to make this poem stand out more and give it an additional flair of originality, consider putting it more in a story form so we can see what happens. Plus, let's face it... what happens to you is unique, so the most original thing you can write about is yourself. And that's awesome.

Thanks for posting this and see you around YWS!