Young Writers Society

First off, I'm not sure if you've seen a picture of a star up-close, but those things are gorgeous. That said, I understand the sentiment, but would rather take it in a different interpretive direction. This means that since you used stars plural, the meaning of getting close to see their beauty leaves you in black, empty space. Alternatively, it could be the sentiment that it's impossible to get close either due to distance or the fact that stars we see are already dead/gone.

Regardless, the impact is true--meaning it's not very deep or resonant, but rather I read this and I say yes, good--and that gives you a foundation on which you can either
a.) expand the idea or
b.) stick to your brevity and hope others pick it apart as your reviewers have.

All that said, I'd hate to be the recipient of this poem, so there's some merit there. Your words are decent. I think I'd just like to see more for context.

Hi Strangelove! I wanted to say that I like the concept, but the brevity of the piece means I know it won't stay with me long. I think there's a strong enough idea that you could turn this into a fully fledged poem, something which gives a deeper story about these two personas. I'd like to see you compare the love interest to other things which they could be which might give other insights into their personality/ the relationship they had with the speaker.

So far from this I can get the feel that they did get close and that's when things started to go wrong and I sense that the speaker perhaps regrets getting close to them and losing that initial sense of perfection. Those early feelings of romance.

However, as it currently stands there's not enough story for me to go away thinking about this any more. Perhaps you could add a stanza which tells us the lover is hurtful or ignorant or just so large that people who get close can't help but be in their shadow? There are many different ways for a person to be ugly close up and I'd love to see the theme explored more.

Good luck with this and thanks for sharing! Also, I like the near rhyme of stars and afar. That's got a nice feel, but if you do decide to extend it, you won't need all the ellipses between the earlier lines and the final line. As a short poem, I like the distance it creates, but I feel you'd get a lot more staying power by extending it.

Best of luck!

Heather xx

Beauty is only skin deep.

I totally agree.

The only nitpick I have is optional. In the following phrase:


"If you were anything else in this universe"

Maybe "this" should be "the" or "our"?

I don't really know, it's your choice completely.

Overall, great work! Keep on writing!


-sbf1102