Medusa

Removed

Nice! I enjoyed how this was based on The Lightning Theif! A few things I found though:

Engaging in intercourse

The syllables here are a bit long and just a tad forced into the poem. I don't have any new suggestions for it, but I'm sure others might find one

All alone,
reduced to nothing,
with snakes for her hair,
evil consumed her

I can't quite put my finger on it, but this stanza is a bit out of place, and doesn't quite match up with the rest of the poem.

Just one little stare,
and life turned to stone,

Might I suggest *a* life turned to stone?

Other than that, bravo! I enjoyed it!

~Kim

Hey Elinor

This is one of the only times that I've reviewed poetry, so I apologize if the review's not up to scratch.

For me, poetry is defined by a formation of words that builds a picture. It is this that separates it from prose. See, your sole purpose in prose is to get across a series of ideas and events, while in poetry, it is to get across a picture, using rhythm and poetic devices as your ways of making this picture more and more clear.

Now, you've taken a serious issue. Teen pregnancy. You are using it to paint as graphic a picture as possible. Your picture, though, is of the problem. It is not of the event. As such you need to focus your efforts on taking the comparison or device or parable that you are writing and redirecting it towards the problem rather than an event.

How do you do this?

I advise taking the problem and breaking it down into different steps. Firstly tone. You're dealing with a serious problem, so you don't want your meter to indicate a sing-song happy tune. If your story is dark, your meter should be dark. You want to create this change by varying sentence length and rhyme scheme if not doing away with the rhyme scheme totally. Give your poem a sense of instability.

Also, melodrama must go. Cause and effect is the only way to portray a problem of this magnitude without poking fun at it unintentionally. This means that every word must effectively parallel the images that you create.

The small images together must progress to build the scene.

You don't need to tell the reader anything about the event, because in poetry events are unimportant. It's the emotions they evoke and the pictures that they create that truly matter.

You need to spend time developing images. Every word must fit into place. Nothing must be forced. Because while each image is independent they need to fold together to form a flawless picture.

Have a great one

Yoda

Hi there, Elinor. I decided to stop by and give you a review.

So, I think that you have a good base to start off of here. But, there needs to be some work done as well. For one, I don't think this poem really flows all that well. And that's my main gripe with it. It feels clunky, especially if you try to read it aloud. That's one thing poetry always has to do, no matter if it's in a form or if it is free verse. It must flow. Try reading it aloud as you edit it. Try to smooth out where it seems clunky to you. The second and third stanzas are particularly bad offenders, to me. You might consider choosing better words there. 'Intercourse' particularly stands out as what makes the second stanza not work as well.

So, like I said, you have a decent base to start off of here. You just need to do some maintenance, tightening up some bolts, to get this thing in tip top shape. PM me if you have any questions or comments.

Good job, and good luck.

-Conrad Rice

Hey Elinor!

So I never read "The Lightning Thief" so if this has something to do with that... well... I have no idea. However, I adore Greek mythology, so let's give this a whirl!

I didn't really like this. You started with a really cliched teenage angst beginning to be catchy, but cliches are never catchy, so it kind of died at the very beginning. Even when you brought in Medusa, it felt like you were trying to make Medusa into some sort of whiny teenager instead of the cool monster that she is.

Combine with the word choice (there is a reason why biology professors teach it as "intercourse"... it's a completely lame word to use) and you have a very dull poem.

To make it sparkle, insert yourself in it. We're only going to feel sorry for the gorgon if you let yourself become the gorgon. Otherwise, we might as well fall in love with a antacid.