Young Writers Society

We drive through the country on a summer night,
engine humming low and the radio so soft
it almost lulls you to sleep, but every time your
breathing gets quiet, I squeeze your hand
like that faithful daughter by her father’s bedside,
waiting for the haunting hum of the heart’s last gasp.

I’m proud—
proud because your breathing is so even,
because you don’t panic when headlights flood your eyes.
It’s been a whole hour since the last attack, dear,
and I love you more than ever.

You say maybe,
maybe the medicine’s working this time;
and the side-effects aren’t so bad, they aren’t
so bad after all. And when I tell you I miss the blue
shaking in your eyes, you say your eyes
aren’t worth the attention anyway.

Sometimes I imagine you with blank eyes,
vacant like the boys we see at the therapy ward
whose hands turned so pale forgetting the sun.
And I imagine you with them, there where I’d only see
your eyes and hands and remark on how lovely
you are even though you’ve forgotten my name.

But you don’t like me thinking those things, you say;
and you kiss my eyelids as we lie down to sleep
just a few hours before you’ll wake up and cling to me,
afraid of the nothingness because it’s all too much—
it’s too much to handle.

You never can explain it, how the fog seems to latch,
cling to your skin like bristles to wool. You say
you feel empty and magnetic like—
like a metal ball, attracting every
nail, every razor’s edge that draws near—but
that the nails fall away once I kiss your jaw.

It’s when you say things like that, those little
spots of yellow paint on the canvas of your eyes,
that I hesitate at trying to cure you
like a man with open sores or
a woman with burning blood.

The clock turns to zeroes and you
check to be sure we’ve traveled
just enough to feel free, but not far enough
to feel aimless; we must never feel aimless.
Because the tightest breath of panic
catches after sixteen miles when you can’t
recall the turns in the highway, the signs
on the road.

And I start to think we’ll make it when you reset
the miles on the dash. You say that the miles
between warmth and worry are the length
of my arms, the curve of my neck, and as
you lie against me, as you breathe against August’s lips,
I imagine these drives forever, always
pushing just one turn past sixteen until you can
rest again.

Ah, I liked this a lot. It reminds me of a lot of personal things... like. A lot. But anyway, I'm glad that you can't do short poetry, you have so much substance in this piece... and I think its perfect fluff and all =] A lovely lovely piece, filled with emotion. Keep it up =]

Wow, this is really good. I like that it isn't over-articulated, but there's still that feeling of something deeper and honest about it that makes it feel sweet. You use your words well, so who cares if it's a little lengthy. It's not overdone, and it doesn't try to hard. It's just beautiful.
Keep writing,
~StoryWeaver*

Hello there.

I only have two nitpicks:

because you don’t panic when headlights light your eyes.

- The 'headlights light' seems redundant. I think you can reword the 'light' there.

Sometimes I imagine you with blank eyes,

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


This is a really nice poem. I can easily feel the solemnity in it, especially from the words of the persona. You know, I was listening to 'Samson' by Regina Spektor when I just started reading and it really fits the poem. The song's emotion is nearly the same as the emotion I found in the poem and that really helped me connect to the poem more. The imagery is well done, and the story is really touching. The wording is simple but nice, and I like the way you cut the lines. You seem so good with punctuation by the way.

Well, I actually have nothing much to say. >.< This poem is almost perfect already! I cannot really say anything possibly wrong about it except those two nitpicks of mine.

Never stop writing!

waiting for the haunting hum of the heart’s last gasp.

"Gasp" and "hum" don't quite mesh to my ear or mind. Gasps are so much harsher than hums, which are generally softer and gentler, and hums are deliberate while gasps generally aren't.

I think that describing the motion that results in the humming would be more effective and make more sense. "Flutter", "tremble", "beat", "squeeze", or something along those lines would work well.

because you don’t panic when headlights light your eyes.

Agreeing with Whisperer that the "light" is repetitive.

whose hands turned so pale forgetting the sun.

This line doesn't make much sense on first read-through, and it took me several to understand that the hands were doing the forgetting, which is why they became pale. Some rephrasing/restructuring is in order, I think.

nail, every razor’s edge that draws near, but

Grammatically, an m-dash after "near" would work better.

that I hesitate at trying to cure you
like a man with open sores,
a woman with burning blood.

These lines don't quite make much sense on first read-through, and their meaning is ambiguous. The man and woman seem to come out of nowhere, and it's not clear if the narrator is saying they wouldn't cure "you" like they would cure a man with open sores and a woman with burning blood or if they are saying that "you" is a woman with burning blood. A slight restructuring and/or rewording should take care of this.

Otherwise, I quite enjoyed reading this. It had a nice balance between sweet and melancholy, and the "you" described is interesting and remains the focus even as the narrator speaks of his feelings and his thoughts. There's really nothing much for me to critique aside from the above nitpicks.

This poem burns slowly. After my first read-through, this was an "awwwww" poem. Then after second and third and fourth and fifth read-throughs I started noticing the conflict in what the speaker wants for the girl, the contrast between the anxiety and calm.
This entire poem is incredibly conflicted, which is hardly a bad thing. People are conflicted, and you capture that beautifully. The narrator wants the girl to get better, but there is something in him that needs her to be vulnerable. When she is having attacks, she needs him and he knows that, so you've created this conflict between his desire for what's best for her, and his need to be important to him. He doesn't seem particularly horrified at the thought of her pills making her a mindless vacant, he actually seems somewhat wistful. What's particularly interesting is that your speaker is by no means dominant. His seeming contentedness with her ongoing troubles isn't out of a desire to keep her weak so he can be in control, it's a form of submission. He wants her to be vulnerable because only when she needs him does he know that she will use him. This leaves you with someone trying desperately to balance, to help but not help too much. His conflict is created by the ongoing struggle of helping without detaching.
The entire poem seems to sit on the center of a balance. You've built this scene where the reader can hear the rushing of the highway underneath and feel the warmth of the heater perfectly counteracting the cool air outside. It's calm and content and smooth, but there's so much conflict and anxiety filling that car that it seems like it should be exploding with angst. Have you heard the song Rolled Together? The melody is "Rolled together we're about to burst apart/Rolled together with a burning paper heart" repeated over and over again. But rolling over those angst-filled lyrics are these rich, soothing guitar lines. That's what you've given us with this poem: pain dissolved in comfort. They are finding that place between 0 and 16, trying to eternally stay in the warmth between a home they can't bear and a destination they can't bear.
I think you've been a little tricky with your characters. I've been referring to the speaker as male and his counterpart as female, but you don't really give any direct gender references to either. People often assume that the writer and the speaker are the same, which is why I have been referring to the characters as I have, but I don't think that's the case here. In fact, it's a daughter that the speaker compares herself to, and it is the boys in the therapy ward that her counterpart is compared to, which just might mean that your eyes are the ones doing the shaking.

You stay in present tense through a shift in times, which bothers me. You have them in the car in present tense and them in the bed present tense. It is surprisingly subtle for how large of a discrepancy it is, but it does keep the reader from truly being immersed in the present moment because the reader doesn't know what the present moment is.

You never can explain it, how the fog seems to latch,
cling to your skin like bristles to wool. You say
you feel empty and magnetic like--
like a metal ball, attracting every
nail, every razor’s edge that draws near, but
that the nails fall away once I kiss your jaw.

This is the only part that felt out of place to me. The entire poem is really all about the speaker. Even when the other person is mentioned it is always framed in a relationship to the speaker. Here you've abandoned that and gone right into the other person. It makes for a nice opportunity to have fun with description, but it doesn't feel right and throws off the immersion. The idea presented in the last line of the section is important, as it establishes that the speaker's presence provides a calming effect which in turn explains why he feels that continued attacks equal continued need. However, I think you can frame that differently so it fits with what you've already set up.

On a personal note, it is wonderful to see what it's like to be in a relationship with someone suffering from anxiety presented with such clarity and insight. Too often such attempts are brought down by either overwhelming emotion or lack of understanding.

That's all I've got for you, Lumi. Hope it was of use.

Hey Lumi.

You say
you feel empty and magnetic like—
like a metal ball, attracting every

The double "like" here helps show how uncertain the character is, but at the same time made me stumble just a little bit and actually skip over the second "like" as I was reading. When my eyes did that jump I was jerked out of the poem slightly. I think the dash does a good job of showing the pause for uncertainty already, but it's up to you if you keep the repetition.

It’s when you say things like that, those little
spots of yellow paint on the canvas of your eyes,
that I hesitate at trying to cure you
like a man with open sores or
a woman with burning blood.

This is the only part of the poem I can say stands out for me. Everything else has some sort of grounding and connection to a past mention (your transition from the car to the ward was particularly lovely), and some sort of continuation (again, the transition from car to ward back to their relationship), but this has no such continuation.

You have the first half of the stanza that comes from the relationship and the ward (curing and eyes), but the open sores and burning blood don't have anything to ground them. They're mentioned and it looks like they could start a new idea, but instead it cuts back to the car.

However, I'd rather you not continue that idea and instead try to make the last two lines work into the poem more easily. Maybe work back in the therapy ward? Something to make the images stand out less.

Past that one stanza, I enjoyed this a lot. I had a minor comment about "length/ of my arms, the curve of my neck," but as I'm reading again I understand more of what you were referring to. It could be another bit of ungrounded imagery; you can decide on that.

Drop me a line if you have any questions or comments.

~Rosey

This is a reminder for myself.

Hey, hey!

Alright so I'm a little conflicted over this one. On the one side, I love your tone and the content behind it is great; there's a wonderful story that's building up and you've done the genre of Narrative poetry proud in that sense. However, I'd like some parts of it to be firmer. I feel that the reader doesn't take enough away with them after reading this and that's a shame because it's a beautiful piece and it feels like it should have more affect on its audience.

You capture your reader well and bring them in close, tell them the story and then you bring them in closer still, as if to give the moral but at the last moment say nothing. It's perfectly enjoyable in its own right but I don't know what to think of its intentions. I feel as if it should make me sad or something but it doesn't particularly. So... I don't know. Anyway! On to the comments:

We drive through the country on a summer night,
engine humming low and the radio so soft
it almost lulls you to sleep, but every time your
breathing gets quiet, I squeeze your hand
like that faithful daughter by her father’s bedside,
waiting for the haunting hum of the heart’s last gasp. [Oh man now this is hard to read. Do remember that poetry is written to be read out loud and while it often isn't these days, it should still be constructed in such a way that it can be. By the time I hit gasp, I really was just out of breath. There's nowhere to stop. It's nice in that the words wash over you and it reflects the movement of the car, I'm sure but I think it needs a full stop in there. Maybe after sleep? That would be nicely reflective of the wording if nothing else. And then a comma after but would follow that smoothly. Also, love the use of gasp. I like how is stands out sharper against the other words and the internal rhyme of last and gasp is wonderful. Very nice.]

I’m proud—
proud because your breathing is so even, [Hmm. This line should be more poetic. It feels much too like prose and halts your flow somewhat. I'd suggest something like, 'of your even breath, proud'.]
because you don’t panic when headlights flood your eyes.
It’s been a whole hour since the last attack, dear,
and I love you more than ever. [Not sure about this line either. It's a little too ordinary and tells us nothing of the speaker or their feelings. If the speaker is trying to reassure themself of their love, it should be more exaggerated. If you want a dark spin to it, that could be done too. I think it just needs to give us a clue about your persona, otherwise this could be the words of absolutely any character. In poetry there's no room for ordinary lines or at least, they can only be ordinary if they are so purposefully.]

Sometimes I imagine you with blank eyes,
vacant like the boys we see at the therapy ward
whose hands turned so pale forgetting the sun. [A little grammar here would make this line easier to read. Perhaps a comma after pale? Alternatively you could re-phrase to along the lines of: 'whose hands forgot the sun and paled like papyrus.']
And I imagine you with them, there where I’d only see
your eyes and hands and remark on how lovely
you are even though you’ve forgotten my name.

But you don’t like me thinking those things, you say;
and you kiss my eyelids as we lie down to sleep
just a few hours before you’ll wake up and cling to me,
afraid of the nothingness because it’s all too much—
it’s too much to handle. [Wait, we're out of the car now? I don't like this stanza. I liked the continuity of being in the car, of your persona thinking these thoughts while the other character leaned against him/ her and half slept.]

It’s when you say things like that, those little
spots of yellow paint on the canvas of your eyes,
that I hesitate at trying to cure you
like a man with open sores or
a woman with burning blood. [Now I love how this stanza started out but I don't think you finished the image as strongly as you could have done. I think what you meant to portray was that there's something the persona likes about this illness as it leaves the other character dependent on them, it leads to this closeness between them, to this sort of relationship that is sort of perfect and might not be were the character not ill. But the examples you've chosen, you haven't explained what's good about them. They're just loose images tagged on. Choose one and explain it more thoroughly. Like:
'that I hesitate at trying to cure you,
like a man with open sores
revealing his heart.']

A lovely ending, very nicely closed. Well there's not much else I can say about it except thanks for the read and if you've got any questions, feel free to get in touch! I think you've done a nice job so far and there's a little that could be trimmed (like that stanza I pointed out) but this is good so nice work!

Heather xxx

Hey,

This just might be the first review I ever gave you. It might be a little short; I just wrote a pretty long review for Persephoneia and my fingers hurt.

Green is stuff I like. Red are comments. Blue is the highlighted stuff I'm commenting on.

Lumi wrote:

Spoiler! :

I fail at short poetry. Thanks to Spike and Blues for helping me trim some fat.

We drive through the country on a summer night, I've read other stuff by you; you have the talent to make the intro more catching. Right now, it reads like a story and I'm not sure I like it.
engine humming low and the radio so soft
it almost lulls you to sleep, but every time your
breathing gets quiet, I squeeze your hand
like that faithful daughter by her father’s bedside,
waiting for the haunting hum of the heart’s last gasp.

I'm not sure what's going on yet or what the relationship is between these two characters, but right now I see a guy and a girl, the girl speaking? This reads very much like prose, which is not neccesarily a bad thing. However, while the descriptions are excellent, the words can be more delicate, more poetic.

I’m proud—
proud because your breathing is so even,
because you don’t panic when headlights flood your eyes.
It’s been a whole hour since the last attack, dear,
and I love you more than ever.

I like this entire thing, but again, I think it reads like a story. The last two lines are amazing. I'm still not understand the connection between these two, I'm still thinking it's a guy and a girl, possibly married, but the guy is sick, somehow?

You say maybe,
maybe the medicine’s working this time;
and the side-effects aren’t so bad, they aren’t
so bad after all. And when I tell you I miss the blue
shaking in your eyes, you say your eyes
aren’t worth the attention anyway.

You've heard it twice, you'll hear it again. It reads to me like a story. You portray these characters very well, but I'm not seeing pizzaz with your words, they are quite bland. I see a story here; not a poem. Maybe that's the point? I'm not sure. I can see you attempted to do end this stanza on a poetic note, and the attempt worked pretty well, but you have the talent to make this much better.

Sometimes I imagine you with blank eyes,
vacant like the boys we see at the therapy ward
whose hands turned so pale forgetting the sun.
And I imagine you with them, there where I’d only see
]your eyes and hands and remark on how lovely
you are even though you’ve forgotten my name.

Here we go! I love this. It's more emotional, more vivid with the words and descriptions and such. I don't like the blue highlighted part very much, though it's probably my queasy stomach speaking; it gives me the image of crawling hands and eyeballs all over a mental ward and it's not a very pleasant picture. I really like the 'remark on how lovely..etc' part and the 'Sometimes I imagine you with...etc' part, though.


But you don’t like me thinking those things, you say;
and you kiss my eyelids as we lie down to sleep
just a few hours before you’ll wake up and cling to me,
afraid of the nothingness because it’s all too much—
it’s too much to handle.

I don't understand the last part of the blue highlighted bit. So the sick person says that the not-sick narrator wll wake up and cling to her/him? It confuses me, but other than that, brilliant stanza.

You never can explain it, how the fog seems to latch,
cling to your skin like bristles to wool. You say I don't like the use of 'cling' again, but I like it better in the above stanza than this one.
you feel empty and magnetic like—
like a metal ball, attracting every
nail, every razor’s edge that draws near—but
that the nails fall away once I kiss your jaw.

Overall, this stanza was very nice. The feeling that I was reading a story is gone and I wish the above stanzas were more like this one, because it's veeeeerryyyy good!

It’s when you say things like that, those little
spots of yellow paint on the canvas of your eyes,
that I hesitate at trying to cure you
like a man with open sores or
a woman with burning blood.

Perfect.

The clock turns to zeroes and you
check to be sure we’ve traveled
just enough to feel free, but not far enough
to feel aimless; we must never feel aimless.
Because the tightest breath of panic
catches after sixteen miles when you can’t
recall the turns in the highway, the signs
on the road.

Perfect again. I love the incorporation of 'sixteen miles' here, instead of the first or last stanza or something. I like how it's not a very big deal in the narration of the poem itself, but it fits perfectly as the title.

And I start to think we’ll make it when you reset
the miles on the dash. You say that the miles
between warmth and worry are the length
of my arms, the curve of my neck, and as
you lie against me, as you breathe against August’s lips, Oh my gosh, I love these lines.
I imagine these drives forever, always
pushing just one turn past sixteen until you can
rest again.

I think the ending was a bit anti-climatic. It was good, but it could have been much better.

Overall, very good poem. There were a few problems in the begining which might deter readers but maybe it's only me. I really liked this, the story it told, the imagery (towards the end) and the way you made this so calm and casual, but with so much emotion. I'm not sure that last part made sense. Sorry. I'm a little tired. ^_^

Shoot me a message if you have any questions or want another review.

Grade: A

~jas

P.S. I'm sorry about the different greens and reds and blues, I guess I was pressing the wrong colors.

Finally got to this Lumsters. Tried to make it encompass this piece more.

There are parts to this I enjoyed reading, pushed the piece forward. Then there were parts that hit the brakes on that. Then there are parts that work like adding weight to a sinking ship. You like this piece yes? It's got parts to it that are personable, more real then anything I've seen you write, but quickly slink back to your old ways.

Let me start by the one part that was like a bomb of destruction on your piece.

afraid of the nothingness because it’s all too much—
it’s too much to handle.

It falls into really the kind of basics of poetry. It's too much? What? The nothingness? The fear? How is it too much?
That line, used over and over, in itself is meaningless and poorly constructed. And made me pause when I read this because it acts like a stopper to your poem from going over a certain degree of effectiveness.
I'm not saying this line could never be powerful, but so often is it disappointing to see that is stands pretty useless and poorly used.

Next, your flow man. Half the time this reads like prose, but it's not prose. It's a poem. You don't draw me from sentence to sentence. Often punctuation is pretty useless in poetry, while it stands a purpose and an important part of it. And it's not only that, it's the way it's written. It's in a prosaic voice, not a poetic ones. And some people can never alternate, others just need practice. Personally, I can't written prose like you can, but often certain ways of writing prose translate poorly into poetry. It doesn't translate poorly here, rather makes it hard to read. Makes YOU seem confused to what you're doing, not your piece because it draws my attention away from the words.

We drive through the country on a summer night, [PAUSE] <- Natural
engine humming low and the radio so soft [PAUSE] <- Unnatural
it almost lulls you to sleep, but every time your [PAUSE] <- Very unnatural
breathing gets quiet, I squeeze your hand [PAUSE] <- Mildly unnatural
like that faithful daughter by her father’s bedside, [PAUSE] <- Natural
waiting for the haunting hum of the heart’s last gasp.

Some of your breaks nearly serve as punctuation, but comes at parts where the reader is in tune with what is being said, and they're cut off. Work on your enjambment Lumi, at least for this piece. Saves me from choking on my words every time you hit the enter button. Even if you just experiment with it, perhaps write a poem as a block of text and read it aloud to yourself and hit enter where ever the break feels/sounds most natural to you.

Next,

It’s when you say things like that, those little
spots of yellow paint on the canvas of your eyes,
that I hesitate at trying to cure you
like a man with open sores or
a woman with burning blood.

Your imagery gets a little loose in places. How do we get from the girl to the therapy ward to illness/wounds? I'm not following your progression. Finish building the bridge before you go over it yes? I can see the connection between the subject of your poem and the therapy wards, and then the loose connection between the therapy ward and the diseases, but it's not enough to jump from mental illnesses to something physical. But that's because I've been a kind reader and jumped the rest for you. It's up to you to finish knitting in the threads of your poem, not for me to assume on the content.
I can jump in opinion on the piece, what I think this and this means. But not that actual content.

Lastly,

And I start to think we’ll make it when you reset
the miles on the dash. You say that the miles
between warmth and worry are the length
of my arms, the curve of my neck, and as
you lie against me, as you breathe against August’s lips,
I imagine these drives forever, always
pushing just one turn past sixteen until you can
rest again.

The bolded part are lines I'm a fan of, just because it appeals to me, but I thought I'd let you know

You lose sommmmee clarity here through the abrupt introduction of new knick knacks. What does August have to do with anything and what does it bring to the table for me aside from looking pretty on paper?

Nice to something real out of ya. Draws from you, or about you, or someone else.

Lots of love,

Kamas

I love this poem, it is full with emotion and very good imagery. I noticed little things but they were cleared up by the people that reviewed before me. Overall, nice poem and keep on writing.

You asked for it Lumi. Dijon here to do your review.

Life certainly tosses shit at us we don't expect Lumi. Doors open, doors close, doors never existed. Either too young or old to do something about them most of the time. Then we get lucky and are born the right way or just prepared. So I'm glad we both got to be in this moment right now, despite everything else in life. Take that moment to reflect. Two years from now life will be different, hopefully. Maybe we could, or you could, revisit this then. Nonetheless, your poem.

Lumi wrote:We drive through the country on a summer night,
engine humming low and the radio so soft
it almost lulls you to sleep, but every time your
breathing gets quiet, I squeeze your hand
like that faithful daughter by her father’s bedside,
waiting for the haunting hum of the heart’s last gasp.

I’m proud—
proud because your breathing is so even,
because you don’t panic when headlights flood your eyes.
It’s been a whole hour since the last attack, dear,
and I love you more than ever.

You say maybe,
maybe the medicine’s working this time;
and the side-effects aren’t so bad, they aren’t
so bad after all. And when I tell you I miss the blue
shaking in your eyes, you say your eyes
aren’t worth the attention anyway.

Sometimes I imagine you with blank eyes,
vacant like the boys we see at the therapy ward
whose hands turned so pale forgetting the sun.
And I imagine you with them, there where I’d only see
your eyes and hands and remark on how lovely
you are even though you’ve forgotten my name.

But you don’t like me thinking those things, you say;
and you kiss my eyelids as we lie down to sleep
just a few hours before you’ll wake up and cling to me,
afraid of the nothingness because it’s all too much—
it’s too much to handle.

You never can explain it, how the fog seems to latch,
cling to your skin like bristles to wool. You say
you feel empty and magnetic like—
like a metal ball, attracting every
nail, every razor’s edge that draws near—but
that the nails fall away once I kiss your jaw.

It’s when you say things like that, those little
spots of yellow paint on the canvas of your eyes,
that I hesitate at trying to cure you
like a man with open sores or
a woman with burning blood.

The clock turns to zeroes and you
check to be sure we’ve traveled
just enough to feel free, but not far enough
to feel aimless; we must never feel aimless.
Because the tightest breath of panic
catches after sixteen miles when you can’t
recall the turns in the highway, the signs
on the road.

And I start to think we’ll make it when you reset
the miles on the dash. You say that the miles
between warmth and worry are the length
of my arms, the curve of my neck, and as
you lie against me, as you breathe against August’s lips,
I imagine these drives forever, always
pushing just one turn past sixteen until you can
rest again.

You know what Lumi? Stanza by stanza won't do me any good here. Nor you. Not at all Lumi, who sits on the tower of Dijon.

Print out this poem. Cut up the lines individually. Then cut up the word in each line. Rearrange the lines. See what they mean. Do they mean anything? Or are you narrating the entire expanse of the poem with occasional detail and imagery? Then put the lines together, but this time, put the lines together in a random order. Have no direction.

See what poem you end up with. The thing is, I have a hard, hard time figuring out what makes all of this a poem. You tell, tell, tell, tell, and show, and tell, and tell, and tell, and maybe hint at showing.

You do so much thinking in narrating and narrating in telling, that I forget what you're showing. Why do I care?

Maybe even more poignant, who are you writing to and for Lumi? Why are you writing this poem? It almost feels to me, that your vision and voice is covered up here, like it's being buried under another voice that's unrelenting in coming out, and cannot be honest with itself. Show us what you aim to present in your poetic voice and give us a world to chew on.

Hello dear,

Thanks for the request.
I don't think I've reviewed anything for you before, well if I have I don't remember You might have heard me say this before but just to make myself really clear;

I'm not an expert with poetry. It's something I really want to acheive and I'm working on it often but it's not a strong point of mine. I love reading, writing it and reviewing it, even though my version of poems can be a little *coughs* on the bad side. Anyhow, I don't think my reviewing standards on poetry are as bad as my poetry itself. So you're ok.

If I repeat things, I apologies but I haven't read any of the reviews below so please do excuse me if I repeat what other people have said.

Now, apart from all of that, I'll get on to what you've been waiting for. I'll go through stanza by stanza giving my opinion as I go. Before I start; congratulations on being featured.

Lumi wrote:We drive through the country on a summer night,
engine humming low and the radio so soft
it almost lulls you to sleep, but every time your
breathing gets quiet, I squeeze your hand
like that faithful daughter by her father’s bedside,
waiting for the haunting hum of the heart’s last gasp.

So If I'm honest, I find this verse, vacant, empty and a little bit like you're going for a stroll on the beach and taking a long, long time. You're first line I found so uninteresting it turns me away from this poem completely. I didn't feel like reading more-it felt almost clichéd, I mean; We drive through the country on a summer night. To me, it's the general opening line for either disaster or happy ever after. I know too much and I'm at the beginning. I have two paths; Happy ever after--> Disaster. You may find me completely wrong here but even figuring out those two paths already is enough to make me turn back. You've given away some of your plot for a pretty dead stanza. I'd give this verse a bit of a makeover, add some spark or flame of interest to it and then you'll have made this a bit better. As for the rest of the verse, I don't find this informative at all, I didn't give us that leading sentence to make us slide into the next stanza. You gave us two feeding points;
- You're in the car, in the country with the radio on.
- The radio is causing this person to fall asleep and you're trying to wake her.
Now, being terribly blunt here, What makes you want to read on in that? Am I being clear or just darn confusing?

I’m proud—
proud because your breathing is so even,
because you don’t panic when headlights flood your eyes.
It’s been a whole hour since the last attack, dear,
and I love you more than ever.

I'm somewhat relived. This stanza is a little better. We've got some idea what might happen but you haven't fed us too much information at once. The only nit-pick I have here is that I kind of need to have an inkling of what's going on. You mention something about an attack, I immediatly think cancer of some sort but yet, I cannot be sure. Now sometimes, dragging on unknown topics can be a good thing, an exciting thing. Here, if you wanted to capture that, you didn't. (To be terribly blunt) You've dragged us screaming into the second stanza and ranted on with some description, and it's quite lovely description, I might add. But you haven't brough us anywhere. The only place I am right now, is a confused place. A place where, I have an idea what you might be talking about but on the other hand, I'm getting angry because I'm annoyed I'm not in on this something you're talking about. Even though you're dropping little hints, and I know what you're trying to do, it's just getting darker and darker. We need some kind of... line that will help us have any idea what you're talking about. As I said, this verse is better then the first but still... they aren't that far away from each other.

You say maybe,
maybe the medicine’s working this time;
and the side-effects aren’t so bad, they aren’t
so bad after all. And when I tell you I miss the blue
shaking in your eyes, you say your eyes
aren’t worth the attention anyway.

Firstly, did I miss something or when did this person wake up? I know, in poetry, you don't have to add in every little spiff of detail but... this lack of information bugs me. I feel like you've skipped a part of the story and haven't told me enough so I could fill in the gap. But out of all three stanza's so far, this one is my favourite. You still haven't let me in on the topic being so beautifully discussed but I think we're gettin there. Another little nit-pick;

and the side-effects aren’t so bad, they aren’t
so bad after all. And when I tell you I miss the blue

I find the repetition of so bad at all un-necessary here so I think, it would roll better if you chopped that bit out.

Sometimes I imagine you with blank eyes,
vacant like the boys we see at the therapy ward
whose hands turned so pale forgetting the sun.
And I imagine you with them, there where I’d only see
your eyes and hands and remark on how lovely
you are even though you’ve forgotten my name.

Before I go a step further,

whose hands turned so pale forgetting the sun.

This doesn't make sense. At all. I think it's mainly the placing of the words but it sounds so terrible I had to mention it before I went on my rant about the verse. I think what you're trying to say here is that the person's hands haven't seen the light of day in a good while. Whatever you're tyring to say, I suggest strongly that you re-word this or change it completely. The grammar is terrible (I hate being harsh but remember; I'm helping! Hopefully...) I like this stanza in general though, your description is truely shining here and the obvious talent you have is finally peaking through the clouds. You've dropped some more of your sneaky hints and I'm kind of regretting what I said about the second stanza. I like what you've done here. So, this just shows how sometimes I can be wrong? So, I admit, I like this tactic. This verse is a definite like for me. Good job, this poem is really taking it's hold on me.

But you don’t like me thinking those things, you say; No comma after things and no semi-colon after you say.It's not needed and cuts the flow.
and you kiss my eyelids as we lie down to sleepI'd take out the and here, it makes the rythme un-easy.
just a few hours before you’ll wake up and cling to me,
afraid of the nothingness because it’s all too much—
it’s too much to handle.

So I found this verse a little wonky grammar wise. The comments in red express me suggestions on changing the mistakes above. Otherwise, I don't have much to say with this; I like it. I really do. If the first couple of verses were fixed, I'd jam my finger on the like button forever and a day. If I was to pick out one thing, I'd say that in the line were you mention the person clinging to you afraid of the nothingess you're a little bit vacant here, again. The nothingness is such a... well dangerous word to use in this situation. I think you left us hanging on that one line, it's sort of deep with an eerie sense of well... nothing. Without confusing you, what I'm trying to say, is thatby using the word nothingness it makes us feel nothing. I thought that wasn't the best place to add that in especially after providing us with a really good previous stanza's. It's minor but major at the same time, if I make myself clear.


You never can explain it, how the fog seems to latch, I think you should re-arrange [i]never and can here so its like; You can never explain...
cling to your skin like bristles to wool. You say You need to add an s after cling.
you feel empty and magnetic like—
like a metal ball, attracting every
nail, every razor’s edge that draws near—but
that the nails fall away once I kiss your jaw.[/i]

Alright, so this verse was a bit dodgy. You explain a lot of things here, well, some things in a lot of detail. You said that the person felt magnetic like, how? Why? What? This is such a deep and meaningful part of the whole story that I feel you need to give us more information. Almost like you've forgotten your readers aren't in your head. We don't know what's going on in there so make sure you make yourself as clear as you possibly can. I kind of get your drift but thats about it. I'm not sure... which I should be. Coming to the end now, every little detail is vital.

It’s when you say things like that, those little
spots of yellow paint on the canvas of your eyes,
that I hesitate at trying to cure you
like a man with open sores or
a woman with burning blood.

Ok, now we'e drifing back to confusing mode. I've lost you again. After the first two lines I stopped, re-read, read again then a couple more times. What do you mean, try and cure you? A man with open sores? A woman with burning blood? How is any of this relative to anything? You haven't explained yourself, so I've completely lost you. I don't know what's happening anymore or why for that matter. I've kind of gripped the topic now; someone's sick. Why? With what? How do you cure her? What's this about burning blood and sores? Help us here. I'm drowing in a sea of utter confusion. I'm not sure how I can help you because, I don't know how I can help myself. WHAT IS GOIN ON? As I said before but I stress; We don't know what's going on in your mind, you have to show us. Tell us. Give us anything to make us understand because right now, I don't know anymore.

The clock turns to zeroes and you
check to be sure we’ve traveled
just enough to feel free, but not far enough
to feel aimless; we must never feel aimless.
Because the tightest breath of panic
catches after sixteen miles when you can’t
recall the turns in the highway, the signs
on the road.

By zeroes do you mean o'clocks? Like one o'clock, two o'clock etc.. If not, I'm not sure what you're referring to.
The rest, I'm fine with. I'm kind of missing a lot of links to connect me with this poem but I don't have anything to say on this verse alone.

And I start to think we’ll make it when you resetNo AND here.
the miles on the dash. You say that the miles
between warmth and worry are the length
of my arms, the curve of my neck, and as
you lie against me, as you breathe against August’s lips,
I imagine these drives forever, always
pushing just one turn past sixteen until you can
rest again.

Alright.

Overall

In general, I'd have to say, I find this rather confusing, rushed and a bit choppy. Some stanza's were excellent and really showed off your talent and potential, other's were just plain confusing. You're main problem is getting your point across, I think you're worrying to much on getting lovely, complex words that will make us think she's got a wide range of vocab rather then focusing on actually delivering your point. In poery, I often find people forget that too tell stores. They aren't all about showing off beautiful words and imagery. It's about using images that tell us stories and poaint us pictures. You used lovely descripion in parts but forgot to let us in on what you we really describing.

All in all, I think a complete re-write is need. Saying that, I enjoyed some verses and saw the potential that you had and have. Editing, re-reading and re-writing is all part of writing so it doesn't mean you're bador that the poem is bad in anyway, it just means that you're imrpoving work that you already started.

So good luck with everything, If you want, I'll review again whenthis is transformed into something completely amazing, which I know you can.

Sorry for being so blunt but I hope I helped somewhat. Drop a note on my profile if you need any help at all or if I can answer your questions.

Thanks,
Keep writing.
Kagi xoxo <3

This is going to be a fail compared to any other post I've done.

I really like this.. I'm kind of speechless.