I write again
And again
overwhelmed
With it all, with everything
I allow it to flow
It’s coming out
the inpour and interminable
Release of fiery lines
There’s always an explosion
Beneath the pen, feeling in every line;
Joy, depression, malaise
It’s all there in the lines
I cherish my lines
The writer cherishes his lines
For the sake of staying alive
To see through another day
To give feeling to this dreamy vision
We’ve named Life
If I had it my way
I’d end the phantasm today;
at times, the liquor doesn't taste good
and the cigarettes and pencils markings
don't feel so good either
But something’s there
Keeping me safe, sane
Keeping a hand on my back
Comforting the demons, “It’s okay”
So, I do it over and over again
Write for my sanity’s sake
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Canary word: Present
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125,005 Literary Works • 672,804 Reviews
Hi there AlessiosDream! I'm here for a review in the spirit of #RevMo !
First impressions ~
This is definitely a relatable topic for a lot of writers - writing things down, whether fictional stories or ranting in a journal can be really helpful for keeping life from getting overwhelming. I think several things are working well for conveying the subject of this poem ~ the tone is very desperate, the use of line breaks/enjambment makes it feel like this is all just rushing out of the narrator, and the lack of stanzas add to the desperate/in the heat of the moment effect. Usually I'd suggest breaking the text up into stanzas to make it less intimidating, but I think how you've formatted it actually works quite well for this poem (it matches the idea of words "flowing" or "pouring" out, too!)
Suggestions
My main two critiques both have to do with consistency. Before I go into detail, I am going to say, I can see why inconsistency might be purposeful in a poem like this, and to some extent, I think a sense of disorganization does work well for this piece. (That's part of the reason I like the lack of stanzas, I think ~ disorganization.) However for the most part, I think keeping certain elements more consistent would make the poem stronger.
So the first thing I want to mention is imagery. A couple of your descriptions feel a bit contradictory; for example, first you describe writing in what feels to me like a waterfall/onrush sense with terms like "flow" and "inpour", and then immediately after change to fire imagery. Again, perhaps you did this on purpose, and I can see why you might choose to do that, but personally I think sticking to either water or fire imagery would be stronger. (If you do choose between the two, I'd suggest fire imagery - I've read (and written) several poems about writing that describe it like drowning/with some type of water imagery, but none with fire, so I think exploring the family imagery even further would give you a unique and fresh poem!)
The other consistency-related critique I have is about capitalization. (This is a stylistic choice in poetry, so if you disagree, that's totally legit.) The title is lowercase, which gives me the expectation that the poem will be in lowercase as well, but it isn't; that in itself perhaps isn't a bad thing, but just something to be aware of -> the poem contradicts the title slightly in that regard. Then we get into the actual poem, and I can't tell if it's meant to be in sentence case (the first letter of each sentence capitalized), or if each and every line is supposed to be capitalized. To be quite honest, I personally think using all-lowercase would suit this poem the best, but that's just an opinion ~ anyway, if you do like having capital letters, I'd suggest choosing whether you use sentence case or each line is capitalized.
My final critique is about your use of the word "it".
"It" is so vague, unprecise, and often just weaker than being more specific. What s it?? Life? Emotions? Words? Telling your reader what it is can help them connect even more with the poem.
Praise
Having said all that, there are some really strong parts of this poem! Your vocabulary is quite varied and I love some of the slightly less common words you use such as "interminable", "malaise", and "phantasm".
I like your choice not to use any full stops, it adds to the all-in-one-breath nature of this poem (the only thing I might suggest is adding a period after the final word for a sense of finality, but that's up to you!), same with the lack of stanzas.
I also like your repetition where you have it -
^Using "lines" at the end of these three lines creates a nice rhythm - maybe almost a lilt?
And some of your descriptions are quite emotional. Like I said earlier, I really enjoyed how you used fire imagery to describe writing, as that is much more original than the more popular "writing = flood" imagery, and those two lines
are probably my favourite!
Overall, I enjoyed reading this poem ~ you've made some really strong choices about the tone, vocabulary, formatting and style! My main suggestion would be consistency ( -> punctuation and imagery), and looking at your word choice of "it".
I hope this is useful and if you've got any questions feel free to ask!
Keep writing!
whatchamacallit
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Thanks for the thorough review, it's greatly appreciated. I'm glad you enjoyed my work and also glad that you took the time to study over the piece. I will muse over the work again and consider making the suggested revisions. Thanks. You were very helpful.
Hi there fellow writer, I am Buranko ready to review your poem.
First of all, I really enjoy how smooth it flows. It was really easy to read your work. The concepts you use in tour poem are quite interesting such as the condition of a writer, the life of a sad artist, the fate of a writer in relationship to the surrounding world.
The dynamism of your lines is sooo good. Your poem starts like a storm, best characterised by your metaphor "explosion beneath the pen". Ahh I love that effect!
While your poem is good, there are some issues that I found(if it's intentionally put there by you and disagree with my findings that's cool). I don't like the fact that there are no images in your poem. I get that it's a philosophical poem that meditates on the writer's condition, but imagery is a must in my opinion.
There is no punctuation and that makes the poem feel a little rushed but it's not that big of a deal. Also there are some parts in your poem where you kinda ruined the flow with sudden changes in perspective "I cherish my lines/The writer cherishes his lines". If you meant this as the persona's thoughts it would have been better if you tried to mark the fact that the perspective is changing.
Nice work though, keep it up!
Hello. Thank you for taking the time to leave a review. I see that you are one of the top reviewers thus far - a lot of points! Keep up the good work, it's encouraging. I'm happy that you enjoyed my piece. I will definitely consider your suggestions and hope to write better work in the future. Thanks again.