Africa

Rawr. Hey, Anna!

I really enjoyed this poem. I liked the flow and rhythm, it was calming. I liked how this poem told more of a story than others do. The only thing I might change would be the title. "Africa" is a bit too vague, not interesting enough to pull a reader in by it alone. Maybe something more dramatic, such as "Hero"? Just a suggestion, you don't have to listen to silly old me! My favorite part was the description of the lion, about it's wise eyes. I loved that.
Great job. I enjoyed this.

Keep writing and being amazing!

~GC

I really liked this poem. There is a lack, in my opinion, of strong historically-based poems on this site, and frankly, I liked it. The flow was spectacular, and the descriptions that were depicted were vivid, in spite of it's poetic status. In the beginning, I thought it was about an African being captured by a slaver in the 18th century, but as I read on, I realized that your reasoning of doing such was actually a depiction of Nelson Mandela. Although I do not know your motives for doing so, I feel that you purposefully made the slave trade an allegory for the hardships that President Mandela overcame in his life. When the man in the story decided to confront the "white man," who I initially thought was a slaver, it was almost as if it was symbolic to Mandela's personal confrontation with the "White Man," during the period of oppression and racism of South Africa. I feel that it was a very good allegory, and an even better archetype! By comparing these two periods of struggle in Africa's history, you really opened my eyes to the similarities, in a sense. It was a great literary device, in my opinion. My only suggestion for this would be to, since this is a longer poem compared to a majority of the others of YWS, divide the poem into stanzas of four lines each. Either way, this was a great poem. I hope to see this literary device of comparison done in future poems. It was amazing and truly opened my eyes. Well done!

I can only assume this poem is referring to Nelson Mandela. I like the way this flows in the beginning and the rhyming sounds nice to read a loud. I start to feel a little bit lost in the middle though, as he enters the jungle. It feels like it is slightly off track. I think that this sentence could use some tuning:

for he senses that something is waiting for him, day by day.

Perhaps a different line than "day by day."
I can really feel what i think you are going for when i read this line:

No, it is its eyes which seem to read his soul, and sense his people's pain.

Overall I think this is a strong poem and comes across as meaningful to the writer, I think it could use a little fine tuning.

-Laci <3

The rhymes were very consistent throughout, maybe a slight edit to some of them.

"As he nears the wilderness, thoughts of worry melt away,

for he senses that something is waiting for him, day by day."


"Slowly this paw steps forward, revealing a beast,

its body ferocious, but something about it is inviting, at least."

These few lines didn't flow that well in my head when I read it, but that might just be me, there were a few too many words in the second chunk that made the rhythm a little off beat.

"He now knows what he must do, he NEEDS to fight,"

The capital letters for NEED isn't really needed, if the reader is at the same emotional point in the story/poem than the character then he will know that he needs to stand up and fight, you don't need to shove that in their face, subtlety is stronger in this respect.

The last line could be stronger, maybe cut it into two separate ones, it is the longest line in the poem however visually which makes it stand out. Just a slight edit because you have set this rhythm throughout the poem and then the last line lingers for too long, losing that edge. Other than that I really enjoyed it, very unique.

Hope I've helped,

LMJ

Hi there...I had to re-read the beginning to get the gist of it. I was expecting something different. BUT this exceeded my expectations. This was eloquently written, very descriptive and full of emotions. You could almost picture what you were describing here, which I have to commend you for. In addition, you wrote this in a manner that the reader could connect with the African child. Your vocabulary was sound and this piece was a pleasant to read.