never alone
Once there lived a girl, who lived in fear of the attic. Her mother forced her up one night when she misbehaved. So, she crept up to the attic, shaking and miserable.
She spent the night in the attic when her mother forgot to bring her out. The atmosphere felt untrustworthy, all the girl knew was loneliness in a scary attic. So, there the girl stayed, on a dark and dreary night.
She remembered her bear at ten O'Clock. She awoke next to it. Her mother must have brought it for her, how convenient.
Ignoring the shadow of a person projected on the attic wall, she went to sleep. It was probably her mother.
The cuckoo clock ticked at twelve O'Clock,
But it wouldn't stop, It went on, and on, and on,
Bringing noise to the attic.
Until the girl's ears were strained,
And she woke up, only to see a splatter of blood,
And her dead mother,
alongside
her
teddy
bear.
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Canary word: Present
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125,006 Literary Works • 672,809 Reviews
Hi, here for a short review!
I haven't reviewed in forever (ripperoni on my part but anywho). I love myself some good horror poems once in awhile and this one seems to be my kind of taste. For one, I like the type of approach and by that I mean, the style. You don't use the traditional poem style, which is just stanzas but instead, you have it go all over the place, which kinda reminds me of a jagged heartbeat during a horror movie or some suspenseful part in a book.
I like this. It almost seems like the beginning of a fairy tale (even though this is far from a fairy tail). I want to know something, though: why is she in fear? You might explain it later on but it would seem best if you say why here or maybe that is part of the suspense. When you have the part with how the girl was shaking and being miserable, I think the best option might be just have shaking. Because, for me, I can assume how's she feeling. Scared and alone.
The last line of this poem feels a bit repetitive because you kinda repeat it in the sentence before this one because her mom leaves her up and doesn't remember to bring her down (tbh, I don't like her mom and why on earth, of all places, put her into the attic?)
s u s p e n s e I'm digging this scary atmosphere. You set the mood just right for the reader with not giving enough detail. In most poems, that would be a bad thing however I think here, it aids the mood.
Overall, this was a good poem. I certainly liked the mystery at the end of who killed her mother, although it did feel a bit sudden.
A lovely read and I hope to see some more stuff from you!
I'll definitely work on the repitition and describing why she's so fearful! Thanks so much for the advice, I really appreciate it.
Wow! Horror and suspense was definitely the right category to put this in. I think the thing that I liked the most was the spacing at the end. Definitely gives you a trailing off, and almost like a fade out of imagery. I think one thing that you could improve on pretty easily with this piece would just be to cut out the word attic so much. I get that the attic is the most important setting in this piece but still.
On one hand however, I do understand your emphasis on the attic. It's almost like the attic isn't just a place for the girl to go. It's as if the attic is in itself the protagonist. The little girl isn't scared of her mean mother, she's scared of the attic. It's almost as if the attic is alive with an ominous pulse that the girl can feel which is why she's so afraid of it.
I'd love more details about this attic. Why is it so scary? Has she heard or seen anything scary involving the attic before this incident or is the audience just supposed to be scared of it because of the notion driven home by scary movies that all attics and basements are scary?
I think your word choice was also really good in this. I just wish you could elaborate a lot more and write a short story about this. Great job.
Thanks for the review! I'll be sure to work on elaborating on the situation and describing why the girl feels so threatened by the attic. Thanks and actually, I might write a short story on this.