Dancing with the stars

The stars will shine tonight,
Shine to dance with me.
My time on earth is finally done,
Together we will never be.
So if with you I can never stay,
Then on earth I have no reason to live.
As I hold the steel knife to my throat
I pray
I'll stay
In your memory.
And every time you admire the stars,
You'll remember me,
Dancing in your heart.

Hello Deanie,
The poem you wrote was concise, yet full of meaning! It touches the heart and shines in the eyes. It's profuse energy and connotations really captured my heart, especially the lines

As I hold the steel knife to my throat
I pray
I'll stay
In your memory

They just send shots of pain in me. Overall, I'd say...BRAVO! Although, I'm the kind who enjoys reading elaborated poems Just make it a little longer, and add a few details to the story, since you put it in the 'Dramatic Poetry' section, kay? Take care!

Keep writing!!!

Hey there, Deanie!

I’m having a good day so far, and this poem made it even better. I like the imagery you have here, and I like the promise that this poem has to become great. Of course, there are plenty of things we can sharpen up to make it even better. So I want you to look with me through this poem as we take it under the knife.

For a poem of this length—the one stanza, one hit wonders—it’s important to do two things particularly: start with a bang, and end with the same. That’s not to say that your beginning/ending lines need to be the same; rather, they need to be hard-hitting and mean business. Consider them the hook and the sinker, respectively. So with that in mind, let’s look at your beginning, where you develop this portrait of a nighttime sky, shimmering with brilliant stars. And honestly? I like it. It sets the scene just fine for the rest of your poem, so I have no complaints. The main reason I wanted to mention the hook/sinker thing is for future reference—you never know when you’ll forget something along the way, and I like to teach.

The stars will shine tonight,
shine to dance with me.

I want you to change the word ‘shine’ in line two to something more dazzling to keep yourself from frequent repetition. Always try to avoid using the same word two lines in a row; and there are plenty of words that can doctor this section up beautifully. Also, you don’t need to capitalize the beginning of every line in poetry—that’s just a myth. So write your lines as if you’d write a normal sentence; in that case, I don’t think you’d have random capitals where they don’t belong! Anyway, I really love the poetic personification of the dancing stars. It almost feels angelic to me, and considering what’s coming later in the poem, it’s a very beautiful evolution of an image.

In line three, you hit the reader pretty hard with your meaning—that this is a poem about death. I think that you can say this without saying it. Ever hear the phrase “Show; don’t tell”? I want you to do just that in this place—I’m already going to see the knife to your throat later on, which I’ll get to in a minute, so why should I need to be told what’s about to happen? Let’s try to keep evolving this flow of images instead. I think you’ll be very pleased with the outcome, and with how much beauty it brings to your poetry.

My time on earth is finally done;
together we will never be.

I’m not too crazy about the changing of phrasing from the natural in the second line he—oh, wait. I just noticed that it’s a rhyme scheme. Well, that’s awkward. I didn’t notice it on the first pass through, so I don’t think it’s hitting its mark. Since that’s the case, I don’t think you should be too bothered about allowing this to be a free verse poem. Of course, it’s your call. I think you’re hindering your flow with the scheme you’ve put here.

I think I know, at this point, what you can do with the line I mentioned earlier that hits your reader so hard with your message. Consider evolving what’s keeping the narrator from her love. Why are they broken apart, and why has it robbed her of her reason to live? Don’t go too crazy with it, but be delicate, as the remainder of the poem is. It’s ultimately your call, obviously.

So if with you I can never stay,
then on Earth, I have no reason to live.

I actually like this…a lot. It may’ve been done before, it may be a bit cliché, but it’s lyrical and honest. I’m not sure about using “never” in the first line. Staying is one of those ‘one or the other’ verbs, so play around with that. The line that follows this seems to be the centerpiece of the poem—the focal point; however, I’m afraid that it breaks the images you had building earlier—the stars, the dancing—and cuts to what I saw as a girl in a bathroom with a knife to her throat. So consider smoothing it over somehow; given the amount of talent you’ve shown me so far, I’m certain you can do something lovely with it.

As I hold the steel knife to my throat,
I pray I’ll stay in your memory.

I don’t think you need the extra line breaks there; of course, it’s your choice—if you want the unnatural breaks for emphasis and the nearly heartbeat tempo that it gives, then feel free to keep it. Your ending is what’s really got me interested. It’s haunting, and I like haunting.
Other than checking your capitalization and punctuation, I don’t have any critiques for the ending. It seems to work just fine for me.

All-in-all, this is quite beautiful. It shows great promise to become a beautiful poem, and I hope you realize how much talent you have ready to mold in your hands. Never let go of it, but never be afraid to take risks with that talent. I hope you’ve taken something from this review, that you’ll remember what I said beyond this particular poem. They can apply anywhere in writing.

Let me know if you have any questions, or if you need anything at all.

-Lumi

I really, really liked this! so much feeling, tension, I believe that if could elaborate just a tad bit more then it would be even greater then it already is. Really brilliant. Dancing in your heart... Such a brilliant line.
Well done!
Love,
EvensLily xxxxxxxx

Good poem! The title confused me at first because of the TV show Dancing with the Stars, but I know you didn't mean it like that, so it's okay. I think it flows very well and is a very nice poem.

I agree with what the previous commenters have said. I think that if you were to make it a little bit more detailed and a few lines longer, it would be better. But do not get me wrong, I admire this posem a lot due to the fact that I can connect to it in my own personal way.

I think the choice you made for the title was excellent. It's so intriguing and makes the reader wonder what it will be about. I didn't expect anything like this, which made me admire it more.

As IdEaBoNe said, I had the same reaction when I reached to the lines:

As I hold the steel knife to my throat
I pray
I'll stay
In your memory.

OMG SHIVERS! Lol. It's so cool! It just sounds fo powerful because you separated the lines so that when they are said, you can feel the sadness, yet the relief, that the person has. It's so beautiful. I can't even explain it.

Bravo

Hi Deanie!

Your poem was beautiful but a little confusing.
Your poem consisted of fully questions. At least for me. Not exactly FULLY questions but then as I kept reading it, my mind kept asking me questions. "Why is this? Why is that?" So, it was a bit annoying... >.<

Sorry if I sound harsh :S

Your poem:

Deanie wrote:The stars will shine tonight,
Shine to dance with me.
My time on earth is finally done,
Together we will never be.

I liked this stanza. The starting was good Very sensible and no confusions or any questions.
Good Job! ^^

Deanie wrote:So if with you I can never staySo if I can never stay with you,
Then on earth I have no reason to live.
As I hold the steel knife to my throat

Why did you die? I mean for no reason? Plus, I think you should put like this:

So, if on earth I have no reason to live
Then, I can never stay with you
As I hold the steel knife to my throat.

Deanie wrote:I pray
I'll stay
In your memory.-Who's memory? Very confusing.
And every time you admire the stars,
You'll remember me,
Dancing in your heart.- You first said you have no reason to live, so why should you be dancing in Earth's heart? Now, that's confusing.

Overall, I think it was good and little touching but confusing too at the same time. Lol =P
But don't really worry about it because everyone makes mistakes.
So, try to do well next time =)

Also, wall post me when you've submitted a new poem. I would love to review it. ^^
Would give this a 8/10 which is pretty good.
I would also applause for this. *claps*

~Cookie ♥!