Young Writers Society

-Likes, follows, stares in amazement, reads it over and over at least five times, claps- O ~ O

I think this is beautiful.

I love the language you use in this piece, it's truly graceful, in a haunting way. You stray far from the cliches for the most part, which I think is excellent. These lines just pull me in. I really like the line, ".....Fragments that tend to be forgotten in seas of relentless guilt and blame." I think it's unique and it definitely sticks with me.

The only thing I might change is the, "what if I told you that.." lines. Like magpie wrote, it's sort of a rhetorical question, and I think that a bit unnecessary. I think the poem would be much stronger without it. I'm also not sure how to feel about the repetition in some lines such as, "...pain pain pain" and "...them them them." I feel as though it takes away a bit from the depth and strength that this piece has.

Overall this is a phenomenal piece and I really enjoyed it a lot! I hope to read more from you, because I think this is such a strong piece.

~FearlessLove4

Hi there! I'm here to review!

Here is my honest opinion. It's filled with good intentions.

So this is really interesting. I like what you do with the ships metaphor, but I think you can still improve on this poem.

I don't like that you turn all of these into questions of "what if I told you" because that's really a rhetorical question, but it still kind of begs an answer that you don't give. What if that person was really told? If you left them as statements, taking out most of the non indented lines, I think your poem would have a more solid feel to it instead of the uncertainty that proliferates. Certainty is attractive in poetry.

Try not to end your lines on verbs. You end on "to be" a lot, which is kind of a weird line break, not to mention it's in a passive voice. Find different, stronger verbs, and don't end lines on them. End on the end of the phrase. Instead of saying "sinking ships/ waiting to be/ forgotten," ending on the natural end of the phrase would be "sinking ships/ waiting to be forgotten."

Speaking of which, lines that only have one word should be used sparingly because they put heavy emphasis on that word. If you have too much emphasis on too many words, your poem becomes a little multi-directional, when linearity would be more wise in this poem.

Near the end of the poem, you stray pretty far from the ship imagery, and I'd like to see it mesh all the things you're saying in the poem, rather than just introducing the poem. Try putting more nautical influence in the second half.

I'm not a big fan of the "seas of guilt" and stuff you've got going on. Instead of saying that, compare something to guilt that has to do with the sea. No one's ever seen a sea of guilt, but we have seen/felt the guilt of leaving someone. A captain might feel guilt over leaving his family to go on a voyage. THat's not a very good example, but it's something to get you thinking. "sea of guilt" is too abstract. Give us a little concrete imagery.

Nitpicks!

I don't get that nightmares are melodies. There seems to be a big jump in logic here that I can't follow. Perhaps find a different word than melodies? Something to suggest music, but not necessarily something that implies good things.

In the second indented stanza, take out the maybes. "maybe" you were put here for a reason. Well actually, everyone is here for a reason, so let's not put a maybe there. Also, it's more encouraging to the other person.

and maybe you need
to be loved
just as much,
if not more
than the last guy.

(and maybe i'm the kind of girl
that would love to prove it to you)