Death's hand

In the silent darkness, that blanketed the night,
Death held out a hand, and walked with you a while.
His folorn, somber air, cloaked with shadowed might,
was tainted with the falling tears, that stained his perfect smile.

He felt the tremors his cold touch, sent through fragile, pulsing blood,
and willed himself to let you go, as not to break your hallowed bones.
Still his frozen grip stayed firm, raw fingers burning the wilting bud,
as oh-so lightly Death began to tug, at the glimmer of the bond you'd known.

You laughed at one point, as Death tried to help you, and dizzily span you around,
just there, quietly in his arms, a cool thumb brushing back strands of hair.
He looked down at you, ash grey eyes wide with anguish, and sadly he frowned,
as he watched you and saw an intensity of light, an inspirational fire, a dying symphony, knowing he was not supposed to care.

In those moments Death thought, and relished in the warmth you gave,
a single tear rolled down his cheek, as you opened your mouth to speak.
He merely said nothing, and fiercely pulled you into a kiss, you believing he was brave,
Death drove the cool knife through your heart, and you crumpled to his feet.

Overall impression: pretty good! I like the imagery and the language is something along the lines of haunting.

Criticisms: Line 4 of the first stanza doesn't make sense. Its syntax is a little off. 'That his perfect smile" doesn't end the phrase. Other phrases have been sentence-like in structure; this one doesn't make sense.

In stanza 2, the use of "oh so lightly" doesn't fit. Leave out "oh" and just use "so lightly."

Hello, tinkembell. ^_^ ♪♫ tinkembell, tinkembell, tinkem all the way~ ♫♪ Ehem.

Nitpicks:

In the silent darkness, that blanketed the night,

- I think the comma after 'darkness' is necessary.

His folorn,

- Correction: 'forlorn'

His folorn, somber air, cloaked with shadowed might,
was tainted with the falling tears, that stained his perfect smile.

- The word 'tainted' doesn't seem to fit. 'forlorn', 'somber', and 'shadowed might' are negative things already, so for 'his somber air' to be 'tainted with falling tears' seems redundant.

He felt the tremors his cold touch,

- Did you mean 'tremors in his cold touch'?

as oh-so lightly Death

- This seems wrong. Did you mean 'O so lightly Death'? It seems like you used the apostrophe figure of speech here. Or maybe, you meant 'as, oh, so lightly Death'.

and dizzily span you around,

- Did you mean 'spun'?
- Also, I don't think the comma after 'around' is necessary.

and sadly he frowned,

- I don't think the comma after 'frowned' is necessary.

In those moments Death thought,

- I think there should be a comma after 'moments'.

and relished in the warmth you gave,

- I think it should be a period and not a comma after 'gave' since the next line/sentence is complete by itself.

a single tear rolled down his cheek, as you opened your mouth to speak.

- I think the comma after 'cheek' isn't necessary.

you believing he was brave,

- The present progressive tense here seems wrongly used.


This poem is really good. The imagery is just brilliant and it kept me reading on. It's what really stood out in this poem. It also gave me a classical feel (thingy) xD. (Have you read 'The Erl-king'?) The story is interesting as well. But the lack of 'drama' doesn't make the poem great. I think there should be more emotion. The great imagery seems to have gobbled up the emotion xD. There should be a balance. (Well, this might not be the best example but here's an example of a great 'dramatic' poem - http://www.youngwriterssociety.com/topic80954.html)

Never stop writing!

In the silent darkness, that blanketed the night, delete the comma
Death held out a hand, and walked with you a while.
His forlorn, somber air, cloaked with shadowed might,
was tainted with the falling tears, that stained his perfect smile. absolutely beautiful first stanza

He felt the tremors of his cold touch, sent through fragile, pulsing blood,
and willed himself to let you go, as not to break your hallowed bones. the rhyme of 'go'' and 'bones'' is very distracting to the reader
Still his frozen grip stayed firm, raw fingers burning the wilting bud, I don't think 'raw' is a good adjective
as oh-so lightly Death began to tug, at the glimmer of the bond you'd known. Known and 'bones' don't rhyme very well because of the 's'' on the end of 'bones''.

You laughed at one point, as Death tried to help you, and dizzily span spun you around, I believe you meant 'spun' here, correct me if I'm wrong
just there, quietly in his arms, a cool thumb brushing back strands of hair. again, the internal rhyme of "there" and "hair" is distracting
He looked down at you, ash grey eyes wide with anguish, and sadly he frowned,
as he watched you and saw an intensity of light, an inspirational fire, a dying symphony, knowing he was not supposed to care. You're using 'and' too much, avoid that word as much as possible. You should describe the light flickering, because the reader precieves it as strong but then you go on to say that it is 'dying'

In those moments Death thought, and relished in the warmth you gave,
a single tear rolled down his cheek, as you opened your mouth to speak. ah so the rhyme is purposeful, why not have it in the first stanza? Is this some sort of poem style I don't know about? D:
He merely said nothing, and fiercely pulled you into a kiss, you believing he was brave,
Death drove the cool knife through your heart, and you crumpled to his feet. This was so sad, very creative. Good job on imagery!

This was lovely, keep writing!
-KatTrain

I love the peom!! I could see the whole thing in my head.

He merely said nothing, and fiercely pulled you into a kiss, you believing he was brave,
Death drove the cool knife through your heart, and you crumpled to his feet.

These are my favorite lines in it. It reminds me of a book I read called Keturah and Lord Death
I don't think it needs any editing. It is really good.

I loved the entire thing, the people above me nitpicked you pretty clean, and other than what they said I cant find anything else to say about the poem, but it was great. My favorite part was:

In the silent darkness, that blanketed the night,
Death held out a hand, and walked with you a while.

I pictured that actually happening and you did a great job throughout. Keep Writing!

This is very very good :D I like it because it explains a lot and because you use good imagery, butttt -
I have problems with the structure.
Sorry...
The thing is, the sentences are too long, and so I kind of loose the gist of the rhyming; but don't let that put you off because that's just me :D I mean, if poems had to go by one structure and one structure only, this is probably the 'proper' way to do it; but I think that with this particular style of poem, when rhyming is involved, shorter sentences and longer stanzas look better.
But as I said...
That's just me
Maybe this topic gets to be a little bit cliche...
but maybe not.
And anyway, that word gets to be so annoying after a while.
Everything seems to be cliche
ANYWAY
You have an excellent way with words and your poem actually makes a lot of sense, sooo well done you!
I don't think that I've read any stories by you, but I'd like to. Because... your descriptions are ace :D
*Hugs lump*

Good luck;
Emmzziee. (I really fancy changing my name to 'Cotton'. Hm.)