Young Writers Society

Ok. So as you probably know, I have been writing suicide over and over again. Well this is a combination of both poems, and I need to know if it is any better.

Sleep evades me
as I replay the conversation
we had that night.

It replays over and over
like an old broken record,
killing my sanity,
and opening the floodgates
of long-lost emotions.

Thus creating a tsunami
of loss, and dread,
nearly drowning my overwhelmed mind.

My hands begin to shake
as the words hit me
like a punch in the gut,
for the thousandth time.
I hear the words rewinding,
and playing over and over
in my mind.

You said,
"I want to die."

"You can't leave me."
The words dripped
from my mouth,
like a leaky faucet
just waiting to pour out
the emotions contained within.

I knew the words
made no difference.
Saving you, was like
fighting off hundreds of soldiers
with a single feather.

Regardless, I tried,
and for a while
I thought I'd won.

"Things are better."
You'd say, with a smile
that never touched your eyes.
Even so, I believed you.

Eyes...

I miss your eyes,
the way I always got lost
in their endless ebony.
The way the moonlight danced across them
in the darkness.
But now your eyes
are eternally closed,
and mine are always
threatening to spill over.

Why couldn't things get better?
I know you tried to help yourself,
whether it was the wrong way
or not.

First with cigarettes,
then with alcohol,
and finally you chose drugs.

But is that really a good reason
to live for?

To suck in more toxins,
to drown in one more drink,
to eventually die of
'natural' causes?

At least you didn't suffer,
I hated watching that.

Watching you slowly
blow out the candle
of you existence.

You knew the things you did
could get you killed,
and now I know
you welcomed death
with open arms.

They didn't kill you though,
you lived through it all.
The drunk driving,
extreme liver damage,
the threat of cancer.

I stayed with you,
to protect you,
but I quit
when you almost got me killed.

I worried so much about you,
you were the sun,
and I was the moon.
My life revolved around you,
but now my sun has blacked out,
leaving me alone in this empty void
of darkness.

I miss your warmth,
the simple embraces,
the smoothness of your lips
brushing mine.

If only I didn't have to suffer
with the memories.
If only they could cast an enchantment
to erase the bond between us.

I wish you would have
taken me with you,
aimed the gun at me first.

I remember finding you,
seeing all the blood.
Trying to save
your lifeless body.

I remember how your blood,
stained my hands and lips,
as I tried to revive you.

How could you do that to me?

I remember putting on that black dress,
and walking down the aisle.
Wasn't the dress
supposed to be white?

And the song,
it was so similar to here comes the bride.

The last words I said,
ring in my ears
to this day.
The only words when they took your body away
in a cold casket.

I love you.





My friend didn't ever commit suicide, but the thought is eminent in all of their minds to this day. I just though I would express how it feels worrying about it.

Thus creating a tsunami of loss, and dread,nearly drowning my overwhelmed mind.

Good use of imagery.

like a punch in the guy

Perhaps "gut".

that never touched you eyes.

"Your" will be better suited versus "you".

Very powerful. The casket imagery alone near for a conclusion packs that metaphorical punch cementing the reality of death. You capture the nature of death quite well alongside the fact that you poured memories when this person was alive to form a duet between life and death. I enjoyed reading this if for one reason, your level of imagery and detail. Keep on writing.

Sincerely,
-Elitehusky

I adore dark fiction and this was very emotionally powerful. The pain that this woman obviously went through is expressed very well in your poem. Her love for this man also appears to run deep. Some may say, "why did this woman quit on him if she loved him?" Sometimes love is not enough to help a person in that state. There is only so much love can do. And if this man loved her the way she loved him, then didn't he try to stop his depleting life? Of course he did. But he was succumbed by it, no?


The ending shocked me a little... Only because that's my exact thoughts when I went through a death of a loved one. Walking down the eisle toward the casket, wondering why the dress isn't white, and why your lover is laying lifeless instead of full of life, but he is still waiting for you whether it be in the casket or standing proudly. That part also reminded me of the music video for Carrie Underwood's song "Just a Dream".


Great work. Thank you for sharing your piece with us readers.

HO-LY-CRAP. This was freakin beautiful. Perhaps not the most refined stylistically, but it had a certain raw power, like stream of consciousness. What can I say? Beautiful.

When I read peoples work I don't look for spelling or capitalization errors. Others do that well enough. If I did too I would just be another voice in a crowd of people ready to point out all of your faults. So I review people on their work as a writer. Is the plot or idea good? Does it capture the readers attention? Does it have the power to make someone think? If I asked those question about this poem the answer would be yes. I loved this, and it seemed very personal. Like anyone contemplating suicide would pause for a moment to think about it.

That was absolutely beautiful!! I love your use of metaphors (My favorite writing technique). My favorite was when you said saving him/her was like fighting an army of soldiers with a feather. I also liked it when you said the person was "blowing out the candle of their life". That was clever:)

The only thing that didn't make sense to me was this: At least you didn't suffer,I hated watching that.

If the person didn't suffer, how could you hate watching it? I don't know, I may have read it the wrong way. Other than that little detail, good job!

Hello Flower-Child.
You have some powerful images in this poem! I really liked:

Saving you, was like
fighting off hundreds of soldiers
with a single feather.

However, if you got rid of the word "like" it would make the image more powerful. We know you don't mean literally, so you don't have to use the word 'like'. If this was prose the word would be would be necessary. In poetry, the less words the better. Which brings me to my next point--this poem is too long! It gets repetitive and boring, and I started to scroll ahead while reading to see when it would finish. You basically repeat a lot of the things you've already said. You need to narrow down your thoughts and focus this poem. Make it concise and tight. What doesn't add to the essential meaning of the poem needs to be taken out.

"You can't leave me."
The words dripped
from my mouth,
like a leaky faucet
just waiting to pour out
the emotions contained within.

I don't like this image because a leaky faucet is slow and tends to dribble. It doesn't have pent up energy (or in this case, emotions). The emotions seem to be pent up, almost bursting and desperate to come up. The words "You can't leave me" are emotionally loaded words. A leaky faucet does not go with the image of desperateness and emotional intensity that you're trying to make.

But now your eyes
are eternally closed,
and mine are always
threatening to spill over.

Love this!

Watching you slowly
blow out the candle
of you existence.

your. But, I love the metaphor!

First with cigarettes,
then with alcohol,
and finally you chose drugs.

But is that really a good reason
to live for?

To suck in more toxins,
to drown in one more drink,
to eventually die of
'natural' causes?

At least you didn't suffer,
I hated watching that.

Watching you slowly
blow out the candle
of you existence.

You knew the things you did
could get you killed,
and now I know
you welcomed death
with open arms.

They didn't kill you though,
you lived through it all.
The drunk driving,
extreme liver damage,
the threat of cancer.

You can simplify this into one powerful stanza. Theres too much information and rambling here. Seeng how it didn't even result in his death, it doesn't need to be this long. You can include all this emotions in one stanza and it would make the poem shorter, more powerful, and focused.

I stayed with you,
to protect you,
but I quit
when you almost got me killed.

I think this is an unnecessary stanza. This is the kind of stanza that is dragging this poem down. It doesn't really add much to poem. I mean later on you mention:

I worried so much about you,

Another similar stanza:

Regardless, I tried,
and for a while
I thought I'd won.

See how that's repetitive? If that stanza is very essential to the poem in your opinion, than you need to make it stand out more. The words are very bland and tasteless. Add some strong imagery.

How could you do that to me?

Come on! You can do better than this. That's such a cheesy line.

I remember putting on that black dress,
and walking down the aisle.
Wasn't the dress
supposed to be white?

I like this! Just this image gives us such a good picture. In fact if you keep this stanza, you can take away a few because they only repeat the emotions of this stanza in blander terms.

So, all in all, this is a very sad poem. It's filled with emotion. But, it's kind of all over the place. You start with the death of the person, how he died, then how he assured he was okay, his eyes, drugs, how he was her sun and she loved him, their kisses and intimacy, how she misses him, the funeral and the last words. That's a whole lot! On top of that, a lot of it is repetitive. So, take out what you can do without, and hunt for any unoriginal and cliche imagery. Also, make sure you proofread for typos. Over all it's a good poem and contains some really emotional and powerful imagery. I think it has a lot of potential. Good job!

Here as requested, and I only really have one complaint.

I agree with mizz-iceberg about one stanza, this one:

Flower~Child wrote:
"You can't leave me."
The words dripped
from my mouth,
like a leaky faucet
just waiting to pour out
the emotions contained within.

Other than that... it flowed beautifully, but that's hardly important to me at the moment.

The emotion was so there, the imagery was incredible and pieced together it was amazing enough to make me want to cry. In fact, I did get a little teary-eyed.
The fact that the imagery was fresh throughout pretty much the whole poem added to the effect, and I'm amazed.
This is a very incredible piece of work you've got here, and I absolutely loved the last stanzas.
The white/black dress comparisson was simply beautiful, and it drew me in.

Absolutely loved this piece, and I would love to read some more poetry from you!

Hello! I seem to always start your reviews by apologizing for being late. Truth be told, these are pretty painful to read, so it takes a bit of time to psych myself up.

And this was no exception. But, you did say you wanted this torn up, so I shall do my best to comply. You have polished this up nicely, though.

Sleep evades me
as I replay the conversation
we had that night.

It replays over and over
like an old broken record,
killing my sanity,
and opening the floodgates
of long-lost emotions.

"Replays" is a bit repetitive here, and it doesn't look like a poetic effect.

I'd also take the last three lines here and tighten them up. Make the imagery feel grating. Something like, "Drilling a hole in the dam, holding back suppressed emotions." Then the imagery feels unified. It would also tie-in better to the stanza directly after.

I'm also unsure of the line "killing my sanity." I understand the reason why you put it in, but it doesn't come back up in the imagery. Since I find this poem drags in mildly subtle ways I'd cut the line. You imply that sanity is getting killed through other images in the poem, and the situation in general. No need to have an explicit mention.

and opening the floodgates
of long-lost emotions.

Thus creating a tsunami
of loss, and dread,
nearly drowning my overwhelmed mind.

Requoting a stanza to show a bit of a break in flow. You could make each stanza flow into the next by slightly altering the two lines of the top stanza and the first line of the bottom stanza. It'd require getting rid of the period and "thus", to make the sentence really long and just flow along stanzas.

I'd also rework the last two lines to be a bit more subtle. The third line has a good concept for imagery: a mind drowning. But the blunt way it's said robs it a bit of strength. I'd suggest a rework to something that is reminiscent of being literally swamped. Something like, "creating a tsunami that/crushes everything in its path" and possibly continuing the idea of being flooded with that. It could continue to "pushing its way to my eyes" if you so choose, although that's pushing into the blunt territory again.

You can also work on linking it to the next stanza, which would make the third line mention how nerves are flooded with emotion so your hands begin to shake.

My hands begin to shake
as the words hit me
like a punch in the gut,
for the thousandth time.
I hear the words rewinding,
and playing over and over
in my mind.

You said,
"I want to die."

I'd almost like to see these two stanzas merged to get the ideas flowing a bit more. Say the words, the reaction, and then have a build up. Maybe repeat the actual dialogue and intersperse it with reactions. You could go as far as to merge the concept of stanzas one, two and three together to create a couple stanzas that deliver the same idea in a much smaller package.

"You can't leave me."
The words dripped
from my mouth,
like a leaky faucet
just waiting to pour out
the emotions contained within.

I found this to be a good transition between ideas, from the pain of hearing about your friend wanting to die to your own emotions. It might be a good idea to stick all the "pain causing" images/words before this line of dialogue, and all the results after this line of dialogue. The "like a leaky faucet/just wanting to pour out/the emotions contained within" bit is a really good transition for the tsunami image above.

Saving you, was like
fighting off hundreds of soldiers
with a single feather.

I like this simile. It might be strong enough to stand on its own without the two (unquoted) lines above it. It'd need to be worked into a sentence to be stronger, but it shows the image clearly.

Eyes...

I miss your eyes,
the way I always got lost
in their endless ebony.
The way the moonlight danced across them
in the darkness.
But now your eyes
are eternally closed,
and mine are always
threatening to spill over.

I really like this. It's a small detail that would normally be worth cutting, but this is what turns the poem into something just a bit more tragic. It shows the deep love between two characters.

Why couldn't things get better?
I know you tried to help yourself,
whether it was the wrong way
or not.

First with cigarettes,
then with alcohol,
and finally you chose drugs.

But is that really a good reason
to live for?

To suck in more toxins,
to drown in one more drink,
to eventually die of
'natural' causes?

I'd condense this and try to get out the slightly preachy feeling of these stanzas. It sounds more like a lecture to a friend (it would probably become more powerful if you turn it into that, even just a mental one you don't say cause you don't want to push them over the edge) and it feels a bit out of place.

At least you didn't suffer,
I hated watching that.

Watching you slowly
blow out the candle
of you existence.

I'd merge these two stanzas together, using the imagery of blowing out a candle and the light slowly fading. It's a very beautiful image and I'd like to see it become more prominent. It can very easily be connected with the sun/moon metaphor you have later, to make the stanzas in between seem a bit more woven into the poem instead of just reading like backstory we need to know.

I worried so much about you,
you were the sun,
and I was the moon.
My life revolved around you,
but now my sun has blacked out,
leaving me alone in this empty void
of darkness.

As I mentioned above I like this metaphor, but to be scientifically accurate it would need to be "my light came from you" instead of "my life revolved around you." You can change it to Earth, but it doesn't have the same continuation of ideas for light, which I'm enjoying when they show up.

I remember finding you,
seeing all the blood.
Trying to save
your lifeless body.

I remember how your blood,
stained my hands and lips,
as I tried to revive you.

Blood is repetitive. Otherwise, I enjoyed the repeating of the kissing imagery (one sweet, one grisly) and the desperate, painful feel of this part.

I'm not going to quote the rest of the poem because i think you've done a good job strengthening your ending.

*

I found the main problem here was how each stanza had its own idea. Sentences were confined to their own stanza, when a lot of the images and ideas would have been better merged into multiple stanzas. I've pointed out a few locations. It would have also been nice to see either very clear breaks in images being used, or just one image being used (you have both water and light as metaphors used in here, along with bridal images. I liked all images, so I'd enjoy seeing you have clearer breaks instead of stanzas without images as transitions)

I'd also have liked to see the metaphors spreading into the backstory you give, which is the main reason I found it dragging. You had some really, really good imagery in here, but looking at some of the items like the part about what your friend does to die, among others, and it's a bit flat.

Overall, you had some good raw moments in here, and it took me a bit of time to get past any hurt from the poem to be able to look at it more objectively, but once I did the thin spots without imagery and the somewhat jerky images and stanza transitions showed.

Hope this helped! PM me if you have any questions.

~Rosey

Okay, so I cheated and didn't read all of the reviews. So if i'm repeating anything.....oh well. Repetition is one of the best ways to learn

I really liked this poem. It was very powerful. I'm not one to critique punctuation or grammar mistakes (I make enough of my own) and most of them are just overlook before you , the author, posts the piece. But (there's always a but) I think if you added more commas and pauses, it would be more dramatic. And thats the biggest thing in this poem, drama. How much emotion is in the piece? Emotion IS Drama. The emotion was there, definitely there, but it could be amped up with the dramatic pauses.

But I did like the rawness of this piece, the pure emotion was...was like sticking your tongue into a light socket, electric.

Over all: A wonderful piece.
Keep it up

XO Change

Thanks for requesting a review!

Okay, just going to start by saying that this poem made me cry... Just saying...

Okay, so, here goes,

Sleep evades me
as I replay the conversation
we had that last night.

I think adding last makes it a little more dramatic, it leads up to the ending better and lets the reader know what is coming...

It replays over and over<< you use the word replay here and in the first stanza, look fir a synnonym to replace it
like an old broken record,
killing my sanity,<< I think this could be removed as well...
and opening the floodgates
of long-lost emotions.

I like the Idea Rosey Unicorn said for this part, Opening the floodgates is like it all coming back at once is a good thought, but to poke a hole in the damn and have the memories slowly overwhelem you is a better thought...

<Thus creating a tsunami
of loss, and dread,
nearly drowning my overwhelmed mind.>

This seems unneeded...

My hands begin to shake
as the words hit me
like a punch in the gut,
for the thousandth time.
I hear the words rewinding,
and playing over and over
in my mind.

This stanza is good, I like that you compare the words hitting you emotionally to a physical hit...

You said,
"I want to die."

I said << I would add this in
"You can't leave me."
The words drippedChange tihs to "dripping"
from my mouth,
like a leaky faucet
just waiting to pour out
the emotions contained within.

I knew the words
made no difference.
Saving you, was like
fighting off hundreds of soldiers
with a single feather.

I like this, it shows how you feel hopeless...

Regardless, I tried,
and for a while
I thought I'd won. << love this stanza!

"Things are better."
You'd say, with a smile << Tane out the coma...
that never touched your eyes.
Even so, I believed you.

Good stanza, shows you got fooled which makes the poem better as you contine on...

Eyes...

I miss your eyes,
the way I always got lost
in their endless ebony.
The way the moonlight danced across them
in the darkness.
But now your eyes
are eternally closed,
and mine are always
threatening to spill over.

I loved this stanza! I love when people refer to eyes in their poems. Altough, going from the stanza before this to this was a little rocky,maybe you could add how in his eyes you still saw the sorrow that he masked behind lies... The eyes are siad to be the doorway to the soul after all...

Why couldn't things get better?
I know you tried to help yourself,
whether it was the wrong way
or not.

Try this,

Why couldn't things get better?
I know you tried to help yourself,
even if it was the wrong way.

I think that that stanza would sound better like this...

First with cigarettes,
then with alcohol,
and finally you chose drugs.

But is that really a good <reason>Here I would put the word "thing" reason just doesn't fit...
to live for?

To suck in more toxins,
to drown in one more drink,
andto eventually die
of 'natural' causes?

This is good, gives more insight into what the person you write about is going trough...

At least you didn't suffer,
I hated watching that.

Watching you slowly
blow out the candle
of you existence.

You knew the things you did
could get you killed,
and now I know
you welcomed death
with open arms

Loved these lines, wouldn't chance a thing about them...

They didn't kill you though,
you lived through it all.
The drunk driving,
extreme liver damage,
the threat of cancer.This is good, shows what his life style lead to...

I stayed with you,
to protect you,
but I quit
when you almost got me killed.

I think you should add in how he almost got you killed, make another stanza out of it...

I worried so much about you,
you were the sun,
and I was the moon.
My life revolved around you,
but now my sun has blacked out,
leaving me alone in this empty void
of darkness.

This is good, I like the metaphor with the sun and moon...

I miss your warmth,
the simple embraces,
the smoothness of your lips
brushing mine.

This adds a romantic view that we didn't see before, before it was as if you were just friends, with this, you add how there was love between you.

If only I didn't have to suffer
with the memories.
If only they could cast an enchantment
to erase the bond between us.

I wish you would have
taken me with you,
aimed the gun at me first.

These two stanzas seem to stand out, there good, but they stand out...

I remember finding you,
seeing all the blood.
Trying to save
your lifeless body.

I remember how your blood,
stained my hands and lips,
as I tried to revive you.

How could you do that to me?

I like this to, saying your the one that found him, which shows why it is so hard for you to move on...

I remember putting on that black dress,
and walking down the aisle.
Wasn't the dress
supposed to be white?

And the song,
it was so similar to
"Here comes the bride".

And this is what made me cry... it is so sad, telling how much you loved him, which, in turn, makes us see again why it is so hard to let go...

The last words I said,
ring in my ears
to this day.
The only words I said
when they took your body away
in a cold casket.

I love you.

Loved the ending...

Overall, this is a great poem, it is long, which will sometimes lose the reader but you wrote it were we just had to keep reading... I loved it!!

Hope I helped,

~Rain~

Heyaaa

I'm here to review as requested. It looks like you've already gotten some really nice reviews, so I'm warning you in advance that this review might be a bit on the short side. I just don't really want to repeat everything else that others have said unless I think it's very necessary. I'm not going to mention any grammatical errors or anything, simply because I couldn't really find any in this! That's a good thing, by the way. I'm not going to critique this line by line either because I've already read some parts of this before. I'll certainly try my best to come up with something though!

Since the first time I read a piece of your work, it is clear that you've improved a lot. Out of all of the pieces I've read of yours, this is probably the best. My favourite thing about this poem, I think, is the emotion and feeling that you've clearly put into it. One of the issues that I did notice often in your poems is the fact that you didn't always include emotions that felt real into your poems. In this poem though, I can genuinely feel the emotions that you're portraying. I'm not saying that the emotion in this is perfect; there are some things that I'd love to see you enhance the emotion a bit. Compare to previous pieces though, the emotion in this is great! If you keep writing and keep practising, you will soon have emotion down perfectly.

My only real complaint about this is actually the length. Mind you, the length itself wasn't exactly the problem. What I found was that some of the time, it felt as though you were dragging things on a bit. I have to be honest with you, at times, I did skip a stanza or two. Your imagery was great. You had good metaphors, similes, adjectives etc. It just felt that, at times, you could have used them a bit less and simply moved on to the "story" you were telling us. I'm not sure if I'm making complete sense here, but I think that you understand what I'm trying to say. Come to think of it, I'm kind of saying what Rosey has already said. You seem to be more concentrated on the imagery than on the story of the poem. Although imagery and descriptions are important in a poem, explaining what happens during the poem itself is also very important.

Overall, I'm sorry that this review wasn't extremely helpful or anything. It's just that everyone else has said anything that I would have said. As a whole, I certainly thought that this was a great poem. You displayed effective emotion that seemed real, not fake, and you created some really nice imagery in this too. All that you really need to do is to maybe consider dragging this on a bit less. To be honest, if you took away some of the stanzas, this poem could actually be much stronger than it is right now. I'd advise you to maybe take away the stanzas that don't really progress the story of the poem at all. If you look over this once more, you should consider editing it up a bit. If you do that, I really do think that this could end up being a very beautiful piece of writing!

Keep writing,

xoxo Skins

Wow! I love this! Well, its actually really, really ad, but amazing. I didn't find anything wrong with it. I especially like the last part where you say "I remember putting on that black dress, and walking down the isle. But wasn't that dress, supposed to be white?" I love that, its mesmerizing and a beautiful, but sad style of writing. Reading this was a pleasure, ad again, please pm me if you write any more.