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[deleted at the request of poet]

Hey there.

Alright, I should probably start this by saying that I am very much a fan of poems such as these. I grew up listening to music with beautifully obscure lyrics and deeply-hidden meanings, so this felt very familiar and inviting.

I admit, the second section baffled me at times, but from then on I could see and feel the story you were telling. Some of the lines took a second or third glance before they entirely made sense, but I personally like that aspect of it. You actually have to stop and grasp the meaning.


The only thing I could see that drastically slowed down the rhythm of the poem was this line:

an eyelid-less gaze.

'Eyelid-less' is somewhat of a cumbersome phrase anyway, even more so in a poem.


Also, the ending bothered me a little. It flows so well, up until these last three lines.

They'd laugh and say
"When God says go to hell, make sure you pay
attention or you will".

I can't exactly describe it, but it sort of feels like you lost steam here.


As far as the structure goes, the stanzas are irregular and varying in length. However, speaking from personal experience, I think any change to the structure would ruin the effect of the poem. An actual poetry-person may tell you differently, though, so don't necessarily go on my word here.
Overall, though, great poem. I really enjoyed reading it. keep up the good work!

You said this is for a competition. I'm guessing it's a slam. We can talk later about why I don't like slams (or competitive poetry in general), but for the purposes of this review, I think that with a little more work you could do very well with what you've written.

I'm going to go over some technical aspects first.

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When possessive, the word "ancestors" shouldn't have the extra "s" after the apostrophe. It depends on your intended meaning.

Correct (plural): ancestors'
or
Correct (singular): ancestor's

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Here you need to slide the period before the quotation marks.

Correct: attention or you will."

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Similar problem here. This time the end completely lacks punctuation. Judging by the next line's capital "A" this line should be the end of the sentence. Do as you will with a full stop, exclamation mark, etc.

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A leper-poet? Or a leprous poet?

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This is slightly incorrect in the sense that you don't usually use the verb "don" in reference to non-clothes nouns. If you were just donning gloves, that'd be great. But putting on hands is awkward. It interrupted the flow of thoughts.

The first stanza would be clearer if you added an "it" in line two:

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Other than that I would recommend using em dashes (—). This is very nicely polished considering how long it is.

On to the poem itself!

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This part is problematic for me. It felt out of touch with the stanza, tacked on you might say. It was so direct and didactic. Oppositely, the end of this stanza was rather superfluous. God gives three metaphors for life, and finished by mentioning that he burned all of his books (hinting at Bibles) in the rain. This last line informs me of nothing and makes me feel nothing. It's a neat way to conclude the stanza but it once again felt tacked on and, in this limited context, meaningless.

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I personally didn't understand why the adjective "circular" is inserted here. It doesn't improve upon anything I can think of, and yet I could be missing something. Anyway... I thought this was a very interesting transitional device. It's JUST strong enough to support your poem and take us to the next chapter.

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In the next stanza the speaker recalls that she "wore that mask." This is cliche and unredeemed. You already mention donning gloves, so the notion of disguise is there. Trim that out. You could also trim out either "blank stare" or "eyelid-less gaze." Probably the latter since it hurts your rhythm. The rest of that stanza was bewildering to me. Cool image but I don't get it.

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Next stanza! Once again you can trim here. Perhaps just say it's an empty sarcophagus, or communicate that somehow without being cluttered and redundant. I love the image: a foreboding grave as Damocles' sword. You say it's "sandpapered tough." This seems conflicting. I'm not very knowledgeable about such things, but I would think it would be sandpapered smooth, or as rough as sandpaper.

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This is a great stanza. It's dense, groovy, and evocative. But it doesn't move the poem as a whole anywhere at all. Where is the speaker clambering up, for instance? I'd trim up the end of this stanza slightly.

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Hmm... spiderwebs... Not sure what to think of that image. This stanza offers some order and clarity but almost seems to be its own poem all things considered.

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The last stanza is a little tacked on too. You bring us full circle with God, but it's just a weird takeaway message that doesn't fit well or feel natural.



Overall I did enjoy this poem.
It seems like you're taking a step back at one point to describe yourself, the slam poet, and your wild, applauding audience. I like the way you bring us there. You describe the tense introduction, the foundation for your stage. You stand on it and have this moment of anxiety, then after you stop and reveal the Damocles' sword, it comes crashing down with this explosion of poetry. There's a story here. HOWEVER: Make this (cohesively) about more than that. This is like a meta-poem, in which you're on the stage reading a poem about the act of getting on stage and reading a poem. It ends collapsing into something rather shallow and contrived.

Much on the plus side I feel the rhythm and imagery are present and powerful. I like the ambition too, but certain places need to be trimmed or made more cohesive.

Hopefully this was the right amount of fresh perspective to inspire and push you along. Take it all with a grain of salt and keep writing. Welcome to YWS.

EDIT: Quotes removed by request.