Young Writers Society

This sky will betray you.

At this very moment, you're sitting in a chair,
adjusting your eyes to the light of your window
and learning how to be alone. You're learning that
no matter how far you run, sheep will always follow,
so you slaughter their faith with a knife in the dark
until the steel burns realization into their eyes and
they witness the stars conspiring with the shadows
as the universe turns her back on our galaxy.

Orion has fled the sky. Cassiopeia, upon Orion's cowardly
escape, burned her chair to a crisp and Ursa Minor ate Ursa Major
until only the diminished tones echoed through the nubulae;
your mother draws her curtains one night to witness the war,
the blood-splattered lunar eclipse and the decay of the clouds,
and she asks you if you'd gaze at this shade over the millennia
until the north star goes supernova and engulfs the rest;

You turn your back, and walk away.

Listen to me. You will live, and you will hate yourself for it.
You will find your mother on the wrong side of her bed with
lips infected by the night, and you will run forever until you realize
that you'll always have yourself and that will never change.
Did you hear me? You will live, and you will hate yourself for it.
You will strike down every opportunity to pick yourself up
even if it means killing a man in his sleep, and when your time
is done - when you banish life from existence - you'll be given
your chance to leave. An angel will come down
a marble staircase, and say:

"You found the truth that I could never see"

You will laugh. You will point and stare and mock
because you know that deep inside, you were never alive.
You died a long time ago, when the stars vanished into
thick air, when the comets fell down and shattered against
mankind and when you found your mother dead the day after.
You will laugh because your eyes witnessed the destruction
of our world through smoke and smog as every grasp of
hope fell in fire through the atmosphere.

The sun is burning out, don't you know? The sun is burning out
and still you will sit for all eternity, filled to the brim with revenge
and sweat against your palms, whispering with the dark side
of the moon and telling her, "There are no words to express, nothing
I can say or do to show you the punishment for those who wrong me."
And as you stare out the window, you will wait for the break of dawn
to hold your fist in a golden light and conquer the sky
before dusk quickly falls and conquers you first.

Spoiler

Alrighty. I haven't written anything of this length in a while, and it just sort of came out. Normally I'd go through and edit, but I lack the focus required to do that, so.. yeah. Constructive criticism is most definitely welcome.

The imagery and tone of this piece are both so strong -- I usually tire of verse that's as long as this, but it was gorgeous. There's something so aloof about the voice, but still so sincere. It's like sitting face to face with someone who doesn't really exists, listening to your future with a lazy sort of resignation.

There are a few grammatical errors throughout, mostly with agreement, but like you said, it's just a matter of editing it up a bit more. It wouldn't be a big deal, but it does interrupt the flow in some places -- the progression of the poem is so smooth that small clips like plurality disagreement really detract from the movement.

Overall though, I think it's lovely. Everything comes together really nicely, and it's perfectly visceral while still managing to be neat and fluent.

That was like being punched in the gut with awesome. Not my most eloquent intial response to a poem, but I think it is applicable and true all the same. When I imagine poetry, I would have to say that this is what I think of. Each image and word you used swept me along and forced me to feel. Feel what? I can't say, because that would mean I have words to adequately describe what I read, and I don't.

I can't believe you're only fifteen. You write like you're an established poet. I'd say it isn't fair, but I don't know if I could handle the potential you have if it were me. I'd probably go kookoo or something. Anyway, I want to be able to pick out something in particular that I either liked or hated, but I can't choose just one thing that I liked. And I didn't hate anything.

I feel like my review is useless...so great job! I'm gonna follow you so I can keep tabs on your poetry. Hope you don't mind.

Happy Writing!
Bailey

I suppose that at this point it is time to ask myself, How do you do it? You are a very adroit poet. Here is my complete edit:

earendil wrote:This sky will betray you.

At this very moment, you're sitting in a chair
and adjusting your eyes to the effulgence of the window;
in front of you, there are perfectly sharpened pencils, coffee
deprived of its true taste, poems half-unread, a song
to a boy that doesn't exist and clocks in retrospect. Here I think it would be more effective to change the "and" to a comma.

You're learning how to be alone. You're learning
that no matter how far you run, the sheep will always follow
so you slaughter their faith with a knife in the dark
and hold a flame against the tiles-- a crimson-kissed horizon
shedding light on every carcass until they all realize
that the stars have been conspiring with the shadows
and the universe has turned her back on our galaxy. This is a fabulous stanza.

Orion has fled the sky. Cassiopeia, upon Orion's cowardly
escape, burned her chair to a crisp and Ursa Minor ate Ursa Major These first two lines sound a bit too matter-of-fact for poetry. I would rework them.
until only the diminished tones echoed through the nubulas; nebulae
your mother draws her curtains one night to witness the war,
the blood-splattered lunar eclipse and the decay of the clouds,
and she asks you if you'd stare down this shade over the next millenia First of all, I'm not sure I like "stare down...." How about "look over," "gaze at," or "watch?" Secondly, it's "millennia..." "millenia" is a common misspelling, so nothing to worry about. And if you mean singular, it's "millennium."
until the north star goes supernova and engulfs the rest;

You turn your back, and walk away.

Listen to me. You will live, and you will hate yourself for it.
You will find your mother on the wrong side of her bed with
lips infected by the night, and you will run forever until you realize
that you'll always have yourself and that will never change.
Did you hear me? You will live, and you will hate yourself for it.
You will strike down every opportunity to pick yourself up
even if it means killing a man in his sleep. You will resent the wind
and the way it sighs until the millenia finally takes its turn, As far as "millenia," same thing as last time.
and when that happens you will be the only one to witness
the death of our world and the solace of this silence.

And when your time is up, when you choose to banish life
from existence along with that boy from a million years ago,
you'll be offered your chance to leave. An angel will come
down a flight of marble stairs, look at you, and say:

"You found the truth that I could never see"

You will laugh. You will laugh at that angel
because you know that deep inside, you were never alive.
You died a long time ago, the moment you sat down and began
to write that song, when the comets fell down and shattered against
mankind and when you found your mother dead the day after.
You will laugh because this whole time, you discovered that death
isn't something you have to cheat if you were dead to begin with
and that heaven and hell is just a place you go when you still have more "Are," not "is."
to learn. But you've learned everything.

This sky will betray you, and you know this because
there is no emotion left. There is no matter. Your life crumbled Change "matter" to something else, and expand that sentence a bit as well. It sounds halted.
between your mothers dead hands and you watched the stars vanish
into air that was thick with regret. You sit by the window every night Change "that was" to "; it was." Again, it sounds a little matter-of-fact.
with broken pencils covering the floor, poems that don't make sense
anymore and clocks in retrospect, making sure you never miss
the chance to bare your fist in a yellow golden and bruise the sky
before the darkness finally falls and bruises you first.

You will always sit in your chair with a mug
of black coffee against your palms, joking with the dark side The word "joking" really just kills the atmospheric tension.
of the moon and telling her, "there is no words to express, nothing "There is nothing, nothing..." (capital T as well).
I could say or do to show you what I will do to punish those
who wrong me" as you sit there for all eternity, waiting "me,"
for the sky to wrong you.

Okay, well, I loved this poem, as always. Keep up the good work!

I think this is a, long, but a really good piece. I love the description and imagery used!

Wow!! I loved this! Imagery was great, and this has a very strong emotion to it. I loooove the title. It's perfect. I think the length is good and it doesn't get repedative or anything. This is really good. You're very good at poetry. Keep writing!!

Greetings I'm LastPaladin and I shall be your reviewer, this piece comes across as something that went on to long. But I shall explain further as I get to review this -- I warn you now I'm harsh, but only am to help improve you substantially. We shall begin.

From first line this line jumps out:

At this very moment, you're sitting in a chair
and adjusting your eyes to the effulgence of the window;

The word choice is pretty much like you grabbed a theasuras and thought which word sounds the most pretentious and clumsily put one. You chose an awful word that attacks the readers eyes leaving us feeling annoyed.

But though you dragged this on until you were slamming us with sledgehammer so much only a bloody stump was left. The imagery is beautiful but in your case the most powerful stanza was also the most powerful but least deviating of topic. You kept it on the one theme and it came across as utterly gorgeous.

Orion has fled the sky. Cassiopeia, upon Orion's cowardly
escape, burned her chair to a crisp and Ursa Minor ate Ursa Major
until only the diminished tones echoed through the nubulae;
your mother draws her curtains one night to witness the war,
the blood-splattered lunar eclipse and the decay of the clouds,
and she asks you if you'd gaze at this shade over the millennia
until the north star goes supernova and engulfs the rest;

This stanza stands out.

Now on to my main point, the theme is interesting but by god you do drag it on to utter death. I understand it's about heartbreak but I was bored after hearing same stanza rearranged a billion different ways as the next stanza. It doesn't feel like reading a new one, feels like reading the same one over and over ad nauseum. It grates fast on my nerves as you had a pretty idea -- a unique one even but you just keep bashing the sledgehammer over the stump of the people's head's. There is nothing left, no brain to feel imagery and no head to enjoy it.

Overall: Less is more and in your case you should have made this at most five stanzas --- don't ever force the length of the poem to get more. It perhaps what you didn't do, but it's how it comes across as you repeat same point over and over into our tiny brains enough. Imagery is lovely but with such a demanding nature of the poem the imagery is lost as the readers get bored and your point no longer interests them.

Hope this helps.