Young Writers Society

When the moon is bright
They howl with might
They bite and they fight!
At midnight.

When the hour is near
They smirk and they leer
There's so much to fear!
At midnight.

They bark and they call
They drop and you fall
They crawl and they brawl!
At midnight.

It's harvesting time
and the bells -how they chime!
And each toll is a soul in its passing.
-A slash from a scythe
-A stolen young life
There's nothing but strife!
At midnight.

And each day, every night,
they force you to fight
in the dark with no light
At midnight.

The nightmare draws closer- becoming more real
It shakes and it chokes until all that you feel
Is the surge of the fear and the pain and the hate,
Being forced to your knees to beg at Hell's gate.
And there they will taunt you,
There they will haunt you,
There they will want you to cry for your life!
And there in the midst of the claws and the pain
Is where you will die and wake up again.

And so, there they loom,
In the dark above the moon,
Behind the somber tune
Of midnight.

GoaGreena wrote:When the moon is bright
They howl with might
They bite and they fight!
At midnight.

When the hour is near
They smirk and they leer
There's so much to fear!
At midnight.

They bark and they call
They drop and you fall
They crawl and they brawl!
At midnight. From here up basicly says nothing. It tells us what "they" do, but we have no idea who or what "they" are. I'd like description of what they are, how they fight, how they leer, what makes them so frightening. Like are they shillouttes of hair with glowing teeth that you can feel chewing at the back of your mind as they raise their arms and you begin to spill your guts.

It's harvesting time
and the bells -how they chime!
And each toll is a soul in its passing.
-A slash from a scythe
-A stolen young life
There's nothing but strife!
At midnight.

And each day, every night,
they force you to fight
in the dark with no light
At midnight.

The nightmare draws closer- becoming more real
It shakes and it chokes until all that you feel
Is the surge of the fear and the pain and the hate,
Being forced to your knees to beg at Hell's gate.
And there they will taunt you,
There they will haunt you,
There they will want you to cry for your life!
And there in the midst of the claws and the pain
Is where you will die and wake up again.

And so, there they loom,
In the dark above the moon,
Behind the somber tune
Of midnight.

What I said above is basicly true for this entire poem. there's no showing.

The parts that I liked and think you could probably work something around, perhaps not in this poem but maybe in other poems:

in the dark above the moon

I like this because it gives us an image to focus on and then you can define that image, you can deconstruct it to it's most basic parts and bring fear with the unknown. - such as the dark side of the moon, and perhaps the craters on the moon. Or you can build that up into an overall image, like saying in the darkness above the moon, ancient light from already dead stars is just reaching my eyes. Not too good with contrustionism, I am better with deconstruction. I tried.

And there they will taunt you,
There they will haunt you,

I like this because it's the basis of perhaps 2 stanzas. You can describe the taunting, and then move into haunting because that's how things work. Plus it sounds cool.

Okay, with that said, why did you break the rhyme in the beginning? Now, the change can be used to your benifit, but as of right now I feel as though it's not. Changing style randomly like that is pointless, but you can give it purpose by saying something different. Like only describing "they" in the rhyming parts and then making the rest of the poem as what they do. The change in structure, rhyme versus no rhyme, must have a function as to why it changed. Well, I think it should atleast.

Overall: Yeah.

Good luck, keep writing.
Silented1

Hello! I love your poem. I really enjoy the fact that it's not trying to take itself too seriously, and though your use of imagery implies a frightening sight, I get an almost creepy but whimsical feeling from this poem, kind of like a Tim Burton film. Anyway, I just have a few comments.

1.Consistency

The nightmare draws closer- becoming more real
It shakes and it chokes until all that you feel
Is the surge of the fear and the pain and the hate,
Being forced to your knees to beg at Hell's gate.
And there they will taunt you,
There they will haunt you,
There they will want you to cry for your life!
And there in the midst of the claws and the pain
Is where you will die and wake up again.

From a literary standpoint this is ok. You have your rhyme scheme and whatnot...etc. However, from an architectural standpoint, having a monstrous amount of text shoved between neat little quartets of lines is not the best thing for your poem.

Some authors have their reasons for the way they group their stanzas, and many will say that poetry is great because you don't have to conform to any literary rules and boundaries. But, regardless, I believe that it makes your poem a bit choppy and inconsistent.

I do like what it's saying and your use of literary devices is all well and good. I feel like this entire stanza could stand alone from the rest of the piece and work very well as a separate poem. However, you're repetition of "And there they..." to the last line could be a stanza leaving the top four lines as a stanza. This would be more in the style of the rest of your poem. This would work stylistically as well, as their are two different movements taking place, (the introduction to Hell, and then what happens in hell.) However, this isn't the only road you could take...what do you think?

Another solution would be completely removing this stanza/rewriting it. Why? Because it does not fit in with the style of the rest of the piece causing extreme friction and a general feeling of incorrectness. More is described next.

2. Style
Throughout this entire poem, I believe I am being sent the wrong message. It's exactly how I felt after finishing a so called "Fairy Tale" by the Brothers Grimm about a prince who gets his eyes gauged out by a witch after he romantically rescues a princess from a tower. This poem's cute little rhyme scheme, non-complex word choice, and jaunty rhythm makes it seem almost like a nursery rhyme. Until you throw in the strange stanza addressed above. Then it makes a complete 180 into the realm of just plain freaky before returning once more to its bouncy little meter. I'm not sure if the contrast was intentional but it was very noticeable and not well-executed.

In conclusion, your poem was nice. I loved your word choice, your (almost) consistent rhyme scheme, and your (almost) complete adherence to your established meter. Do consider some of my suggestions as I believe they will exponentially improve the readability, flow, and style of this piece.

Sputnik

I don't tend to bother with "style" or "Proper rhyme-schemes". The sharp transition was intentional as it was based on a dream that started out simple but took a sharp turn to strange and freaky. The Brother's Grimm Fairy Tale sounds like something I would like to read.

Different people, different tastes. I don't tend to like many poems with a perfect little rhyme scheme that stays consistent through the entire poem and looks like a neat little organized bundle of text. Not how I write. My poems don't read as well in someone's head as they do aloud.

Flow. Now this is a strange poem for me by means of flow. Normally people tell me to ignore the flow. Some want more, some less. I gave up trying to get it "right" so I did what i liked. Anyway it is rather choppy compared to most of my poems but I hadn't written a rhyming poem in a long time and as I said, I don't bother with "style".

I actually thought my beginning was the weakest point. It was really different for me to write such short little lines. I guess I went back to my usual style because I felt the need to balance out the choppiness of my firs stanzas. I'm not a very organized person and when i write poems, it's usually done in one sitting then edited a couple times after reading.

It was a weird poem for me anyway. Dark as usual but a weird "style". It was based on a dream, though, and my dream poems are often really weird.

But thank you for your review. I agree that it's choppy but for a different reason. I like the sharp transition, it's the beginning I'm not all that happy with. Starts out too simple and then I had to keep going with that? Simple's not for me. Well, I tried.