The Demon Book

A boy found a book
this book was a special creation
In it was the story of the world
And everyone's narrations

The boy looked in it with curiosity
His mind begging to know
He read into the lives and thoughts of those close to him
His insanity began to grow

People aren't as they seem,
This book showed him well
But it's best not to know
Or your mind will burn like hell

Desperate he was to destroy the book
Burn it again and again he tried
He buried it and it unearthed
To his soul the book was tied

Knowledge of everything filled his dreams
Fear filled his mind
Desperate for escape
From the knowledge he did find

The book became his world
information everywhere
Knew he did of what everyone was thinking
His mind filled with despair

Tried as he did to fight it
The books power won over him
His eyes filled with hatred
The spirit of him grew dim

The silent betrayal of all knowing
Purged sense from his mind
Fiery rage unleashed from him
Onto anyone with thoughts of any kind

Family friends and acquaintances
Met his eyes and lost their soul
The books power grew
The evil hatred's being grew whole

Taking form the evil god of hell unleashed
In the body of a fiery beast

Armageddon took the earth by hold
A demon over five million years old

Hell broke through the cracking ground, heaven no longer lingered around

Evil in the purest form
Disrupted balance, the universe was torn

The book lay in the fiery sphere
No-one could venture near

An angel arose whose wings were white
To destroy the book whose power smite

Sacrificed her life was for this noble cause
The book let out a screech which pierced like claws

The angels body purest white
Blackened in this final fight
The book's evil purged into the light
And all was over and the sky broke slight

The sun the angel, the book the moon, and peace could not come more
soon.

Mankind forever scarred by hate
Forever feeling it,
the angel just too late

Well, well, well, look who it is. Now, I know that this is your second poem you posted, and that I'm pretty sure you haven't looked at what I wrote in the first poem I critted of yours, so I might be basically telling you the same thing. I'll try to keep it brief, and only point out glaring mistakes.

Litehawk wrote:A boy found a book
this book was a special creation
In it was the story of the world
And everyone's narrations

Ta-da! You're not using punctuation. Punctuation is crucial. To briefly summarize my whole spiel I put in your last crit, poetry is like prose with line breaks, and should be punctuated as such. This stanza, in prose form, reads:

"A boy found a book this book was a special creation an it was the story of the world and everyone's narrations"

Gross. Add punctuation and:

"A boy found a book. This book was a special creation; in it was the story of the world and everyone's narrations."

And with your breaks:

"A boy found a book.
This book was a special creation;
In it was the story of the world
And everyone's narrations."

Now, as it stands, the poem definitely has a weak start, but aesthetically, it looks much better.

The boy looked in it with curiosity
His mind begging to know
He read into the lives and thoughts of those close to him
His insanity began to grow

Line three needs a meter wake-up call. It's way too long.

People aren't as they seem,
This book showed him well
But it's best not to know
Or your mind will burn like hell

The first and only punctuation mark! We're making progress! Also, what does "burn like hell" mean? Show us, don't tell us.

Desperate he was to destroy the book
Burn it again and again he tried
He buried it and it unearthed
To his soul the book was tied

You're forcing your rhymes, and it makes me want to puke. Stop it. Either reword what you're saying, or screw rhymes altogether.

Knowledge of everything filled his dreams
Fear filled his mind
Desperate for escape
From the knowledge he did find

Meter, again, is on life support, and you're pulling the plug. Let me show you what I mean: Say you want to follow the meter of the first line. Not showing you the process (since that is your own process and this is mine) but rather the finished product, you'd have something like this:

"Knowledge of everything filled his dreams,
And it was fear that filled his mind,
Desperately grasping for escape
From the knowledge he did find."

Much more interesting, ja? Ja. Work to make it more like that, more interesting.

Knew he did of what everyone was thinking

Okay, not only did you murder sentence syntax with this alone, but you chopped him up into tiny bits, cooked him in a chili, and fed it to his dying grandmother. Intense, no? You don't need to rearrange your phrasing to make it sound more professional, because there is no real need to sound eloquent in poetry. Read anything by William Carlos Williams. He wrote a poem about a red wheelbarrow. The entire poem reads "So much depends/upon/a red wheel/barrow/glazed with rain/water/beside the white/chickens." Nothing eloquent about that. Why should you be?

The books power won over him

Possessive "book's". Use the right punctuation.

Family friends and acquaintances

Another reason for punctuation: is this a list of "family, friends, and acquaintances," or is it two items, "family friends" and "acquaintances"?

Taking form the evil god of hell unleashed
In the body of a fiery beast

With punctuation, this would be awesome. I actually like this part of the poem. Too bad I had to trudge through a bunch of crap to get here.

Hell broke through the cracking ground, heaven no longer lingered around

Strong start, but weak finish. This sounds like soon as Hell broke loose, Heaven moseyed off somewhere else without really knowing what was happening. This is the climax of your poem, make it so.

An angel arose whose wings were white
To destroy the book whose power smite

I don't understand what this means. Rework it.

Sacrificed her life was for this noble cause
The book let out a screech which pierced like claws

Ready for another tirade? Here it comes: There is nothing different with the first line between the way you have it, and the way it would normally be spoken. Really, these two lines define the poem: this is the peak, the crux, the final climax of the work, and it looks like crap. With a little Flemzo Magic, it reads like this:

"She gave her life for a noble cause;
The book cried out with piercing claws."

Poignant, I think. And much better than what you have.


Overall, you still need a lot of work. Meter, punctuation, brevity are key. Keep writing. Write something every day. Take this critique, apply it, and better yourself. Show me up. I'll bet if you just let yourself go and don't worry about rhyming or phrasing or anything like that, and just let yourself go, you'd have a fantastic piece of work that could blow me away. Do it. Make me proud.

--kf

I do believe I like this better than your other poem. Armageddon is more my style ^^. However, I do agree with Flemzo on some points. There were quite a few places where I think you should have just given up rhyme. Rhyme isn't always essential to poetry. It's the beauty and meaning of the words that make a poem, not the sound.

Also, as he pointed out, you had a few grammar errors, but I think he got them all so I won't bother listing them.

I really, really like this, though. I think that it's a really original concept, and very interesting, too. It really has amazing potential! And I wish you luck with editing. Editing is not near as much fun as writing ^^.

~Becki

Okay, wow. I think Flemzo covered a lot of the punctuation. I agree with Flem 100%. You have to put end marks in poetry. Like Flem said on your other poem it's like prose just with shorter line breaks. Read it like a story and put in periods and other marks when you pause or the statement is over. Especially with Narrative Poetry because they do tell stories. Another thing I noticed was that your stanzas were different lengths; you were consistent until about half way through when you changed from 4 lines to 2.

Armageddon took the earth by hold
A demon over five million years old

Hell broke through the cracking ground, heaven no longer lingered around

If you are going to keep the change from 4 to 2 you need to break that second part at the comma and make it to lines that way it is consistent with the last half of the poem. There is another part in here too where it is only one line.

The book's evil purged into the light
And all was over and the sky broke slight

The sun the angel, the book the moon, and peace could not come more
soon.

Again split it at the comma. Or some where else to make it like the other stanzas.

Overall it was a good story. I know it was a poem but you were good about going into the story it was telling. Good job.
Hope I helped.

~peanut~

This seems more like something that would have use as a book than a poem, better copyright the idea quick ;P

Punctuation is always an issue in poetry, but don't feel bad it's hard to remember to do sometimes. I know sometimes when I write I just want to get the idea out. I always say dots and commas don't exist in the soul except over the letter i LOL

Hmm. Interesting the way you told this story, but may I ask what had become of the boy? Where did he go? And what do the sun and moon have to do with it? Why wasn't the angel the moon, because she was pure white? Why wasn't the book the sun, because of it's firey knowledge from hell. I love this poem. I know what it's like to know more than others do. It's the lonliest feeling in the world, and self discipline must be strict with this knowledge, and you must share with no one. The stress of it causes you to lose friends and sanity, and people start to avoid you like a bird would a snake. And when you have this kind of knowledge, the world looks at you differently, and the way you look at the world changes drastically. I must warn people who know secrets. Write them all down, burn them. Drown them. Rip them up and bury them. if a friend trusts you with a secret, do NOT take the risk and share... it is not yours to tell. This poem has unearthed memories for me...memories I had not wished to remember but I am glad I did. You have been warned.
~Cheez_Burger~

Woah, Flem!

I think that covers my main issues. I won't go into specific examples, Flem really has everything, but just to echo the briefest points, you need to punctuate. But I don't think it's necessary for me to go into that!

The story you're telling is brilliant, my young Padawan. I love the truth of what you're saying, it really does pay to be... not-omniscient? If that qualifies as a word. But, back to topic, the story is great.

How you're telling it could use some work. This is very long, something usually only done by the likes of Tennyson, who had a lot of practice. But for someone relatively new to writing - I don't know if you are, but your style seems like you've only been serious about it a short while - it shouldn't be so long, because your readers will start to get bored. Your story is, Boy finds book, Book tells him everything, Omniscience ruins boy's life. It's a valuable talent to be able to lengthen it so well, and it's good story-telling, but just make it a little shorter.

Your verses are different lengths. Looking at this, it could do with being a little more consistent. You suddenly change half-way through, and that's a bit confusing.

And, your rhyming is a little forced. Often in narrative poetry, it really pays to keep out of the rhyming rut. It takes a lot of practice and some good luck to stop rhyme crippling with you. Your poem isn't wounded, so it doesn't need the crutch! You can do it better without.

All in all, though, it's good. I liked it. And when you've done a little more work, I'll be wanting to see it.

Welcome to YWS, by the way. I hope I didn't scare you off. I'm not trying to terrorise you, I promise!

Hope I helped
~Grin

Litehawk wrote:A boy found a book
this book was a special creation
In it was the story of the world
And everyone's narrations

The intro wasn't bad... but I would change it up. The first line is splendid, a perfect hook. But the second line... meh. It doesn't want to make me keep reading. I think it was the word special in there. Special is not a very strong word. The third line didn't flow; perhaps you could change it to - the story of the world / And everyone's narrations.

The boy looked in it with curiosity
His mind begging to know
He read into the lives and thoughts of those close to him
His insanity began to grow

Loved this stanza.

People aren't as they seem,
This book showed him well
But it's best not to know
Or your mind will burn like hell

Second line: I'd change the this to a the, just for the flow of the poem. Last line: You ruined the flow again!! This line doesn't do much either... I'd change it completely.

Desperate he was to destroy the book
Burn it again and again he tried
He buried it and it unearthed
To his soul the book was tied

Maybe you should put... "He buried it and it was unearthed"

Knowledge of everything filled his dreams
Fear filled his mind
Desperate for escape
From the knowledge he did find

Awkward stanza

The book became his world
information everywhere
Knew he did of what everyone was thinking
His mind filled with despair

Good except for the third line. I'd change it to... he knew what everyone was thinking

Tried as he did to fight it
The books power won over him
His eyes filled with hatred
The spirit of him grew dim

I like it.

The silent betrayal of all knowing
Purged sense from his mind
Fiery rage unleashed from him
Onto anyone with thoughts of any kind

I'd change the first line to The silent betrayal of knowing all

Family friends and acquaintances
Met his eyes and lost their soul
The books power grew
The evil hatred's being grew whole

Family, friends, and acquaintances / Met his eyes and lost their soul / The books power grew / The evil hatred's being ... ?? I'd change the last line. Here, you reuse the word grew a lot. It sounds boring. You do this in other places too. Look for synonyms in a thesaurus.

Taking form the evil god of hell unleashed
In the body of a fiery beast

Armageddon took the earth by hold
A demon over five million years old

Hell broke through the cracking ground, heaven no longer lingered around

Evil in the purest form
Disrupted balance, the universe was torn

The book lay in the fiery sphere
No-one could venture near

An angel arose whose wings were white
To destroy the book whose power smite

Sacrificed her life was for this noble cause
The book let out a screech which pierced like claws

The angels body purest white
Blackened in this final fight
The book's evil purged into the light
And all was over and the sky broke slight

The sun the angel, the book the moon, and peace could not come more
soon.

Mankind forever scarred by hate
Forever feeling it,
the angel just too late

[b] Overall: AMAZING story!!! So good. You just need to find a way to portray that more fully through poetry... towards the end it sounded like a rap song or something. Don't rhyme just for the sake of it, because then rhymes will sound unnatural. Also, you must use different words so you don't bore the reader.

8/10
Keep working on it!
I'd like to see the edited version of this!
- TENNIS