Your Voice

Voices, voices all around me,
Empty words and gilded lies;
Darkness and despair surround me;
I wait for a sun that may never rise.

Voices of a thousand tongues
Whisper in my soul and mind.
I dream of a day that may never come;
I search for a light I may never find.

Discordant voices fill the air,
Telling me to give you up.
They drag me deeper to despair;
They say your love is not enough.

One handhold only still remains,
The rope above this black abyss;
One voice only keeps me sane,
And lifts me from despair to bliss.

One voice pierces all the rest;
One light shines behind the veil,
The only hope that still is left
Amid the screeches, jeers, and wails.

The voice that dared me to believe;
The voice that whispered those three words;
The voice that once called out to me;
The sweetest sound I ever heard.

Your sacred voice is all I hear,
The sum of all the love we share.
Removing doubt and drowning fear,
Each haunting word is like a prayer.

That voice is all but silent now,
After all this time apart;
But still it holds me up somehow,
Forever echoing in my heart.

I like the thought you put behind the poem and can tell it means alot to you.
It's simple, but nice and lighthearted.
I would only work on the rhyming aspect--some of your words were a bit off (up, enough...etc.). I think that consolidating these can help your poem go to a whole new level.
Good job!

Hello! I'm April, nice to meet you Warrior Girl! Welcome to YWS, since you seem to be partially new.

Ok, lets get started;

Voices, voices all around me,

I don't think you need the second "voices". I know you put it in for emphasis, but I find it unnecessary.

One voice only keeps me sane,

I think the way you put this makes the word "only" seem out- of- place. Try it more like this;
"Only one voice keeps me sane."
Better?

The voice that dared me to believe;
The voice that whispered those three words;
The voice that once called out to me;

The voice, the voice, the voice! Try using a different beginning, deary. The same beginning gets a little boring after a while, I'm sorry to say.

I like your ending. It's very nice and concluding.

Also, I want to say that you repeat yourself a little too much. E.g. beginnings, talking about the "voice" a bit too much... yes. Try using more figurative language, also. It will deter some boringness... it wasn't extremely boring, seriously it was actually very good, but I think it might've been a little too long (I almost never say that; writes special day on calendar) and make sure to show not tell.

I think that's it! Good job.

~April

Hi Warrior Princess

Warrior Princess wrote:Voices, voices all around me,
Empty words and gilded lies;
Darkness and despair surround me;
I wait for a sun that may never rise.

Voices of a thousand tongues
Whisper in my soul and mind.
I dream of a day that may never come;
I search for a light I may never find.

Already I'm struggling to get past the emo tone of these voices, which is characterized by sadness without elaboration of sadness. "Gilded lies"? There is more to this - potential - that you have wasted by immediately moving on to another abstract concept without pausing to give the reader a break in between. So give him a break; explain why the lies are hidden, not outright, or at least hint to it.

Most of the remaining lines above require the same care.

The rest is hopelessly cliched. "Darkness and despair"...I must have heard that ten thousand times to date. Same with "whisper in my soul" and "day that will never come". Rid yourself of these, come up with original phrases that aren't taken out of an emo playbook.

Discordant voices fill the air,
Telling me to give you up.
They drag me deeper to despair;
They say your love is not enough.

One handhold only still remains,
The rope above this black abyss;
One voice only keeps me sane,
And lifts me from despair to bliss.

One voice pierces all the rest;
One light shines behind the veil,
The only hope that still is left
Amid the screeches, jeers, and wails.

Again, half of it is not ample enough in wording or description and the other half has been done by too many others. "Discordant"? If they're discordant, then how do you so clearly understand their message? Something needs to be explained or taken out here.

"Black abyss", "Light shining behind something" are examples of phrases you obviously have heard before and so thought it would be a good idea to include. It isn't. Change them.

The voice that dared me to believe;
The voice that whispered those three words;
The voice that once called out to me;
The sweetest sound I ever heard.

Those three words had better not be "I love you", because if they are, this poem is already a total cliche that cannot be saved.

Repetition of "The" gets annoying. Use it only once or twice, sparingly, and replace the others.

Your sacred voice is all I hear,
The sum of all the love we share.
Removing doubt and drowning fear,
Each haunting word is like a prayer.

That voice is all but silent now,
After all this time apart;
But still it holds me up somehow,
Forever echoing in my heart.

It goes from darkness and despair to sugary sweet happiness in the course of a few stanzas. What exactly is going on here? You're coming off too strong; in the beginning, you are in total sorrow and pound that into the readers' heads, and then at the end you are in total bliss and contentment. It reads like a cartoon or bad B-movie. Tone down the immature descriptions of emotions, especially in the two ending stanzas, and it will help some.

In general, overblown and uncreative - better luck next time.

Hope that helped.

Hmmm. Well I don't want to be mean....here goes.

To be honest it reminds me of the tragic sort of 'emo' type poetry I use to write as a kid, too many cliches used in a single poem.

The bit about "those three words" made me cringe, first because it reminded me of snow patrol chasing cars (good band tho!) and secondly because they are the most over used and cliched words in the english language.

The whole thing seemed just a little bit immature, I'm sorry if this sounds mean, I don't mean to be! I'm only saying what I think, I'm no genius writer!

The idea behind it was sweet, and obviously comes from the heart, but some of it just seemed to be rhyming for the sake of it.

Don't let any of that put you off though! Constructive critisism is good

Star xx

A word to the critics: I didn't write this for you; I wrote it for the person I'm speaking to in the poem. And he has it framed on his bedroom wall. I didn't write this to be a great work of art; I wrote it to show him how much I love him.
I laugh triumphantly.

I hate to sound like a critiquer, but these fair people were just doing their duty as yws members. If you didn't write it for us, don't post it for us to read and review, and then tell us that you're going to ignore our critiques because the poem has been used to its ultimate purpose.
And though the people above were harsh in their methods, they are ultimately trying to strengthen your work, not shoot you down out of sheer malignant glee. They want to see you grow and develop, we all do on yws. If you ignore their ideas utterly, whose will you listen to?
And if you're... boyfriend? is as wonderful as he sounds in this poem, he would frame anything that you wrote especially for him.
I didn't write a review because something told me you didn't want one, but I'll see you around yws.
keep on rhyming,
empress