Rubble and ashes
All that's left after a fire
The flames that roared, the hearts that were scarred
I can still see the burns, blistering our skin
From the fire we started, not knowing it could grow
What starts as a single flicker
Can suddenly form a blinding light
Rubble and ashes
The past is done, written in the soot
An unchangeable fate, one we simply can’t avoid
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
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125,005 Literary Works • 672,805 Reviews
OK so you reviewed one of my poems and although this already has 2 reviews that pretty much tackled any issue or compliment, I shall review anyway. (ahem, I am thirsty for points, cut me some slack)
this may be a short review but again... forgive me.
This is my first time reading this poem and wow, this poem is on fire. It is short, not-so-sweet, and to the point. Yet it doesn't need any more description to show the damage and how the narrator feels. It doesn't need to be deep, and it isn't too vague either. Even if you did put more detail or longer the length, the tone and emotions are clear.
The title fits well with the poem and the tone. The tone of being destroyed, to be nothing left except the little amount of heart/feelings the narrator has. So you get good noodle points for that.
Now onto the actual poem itself.
Although I like this poem, there are some wording suggestions i personally would make to help the flow from line to line improve.
First, I would put a little more punctuation or even words in between. That sentence I just wrote was super vague so let me show an example.
following this, i would mention the capitalization but that is all based off of personal style, so I will not dive into that.
NEXT. I will write about the last two stanzas together. Let me make this simple
here are my suggestions
All i did was take out rubble in ashes in the middle, since it seemed out of place, and replaced soot with a synonym to make it sound better.
overall, I think this poem is really well written with good imagery and clear emotions. I hope this review helped at least a little bit. Bye!
This is Nikayla here for a review!
I liked some of the imagery that you had in the poem, but overall I think it was too vague for me to really delve deep into it? It's mostly imagery and I think in this case there's too much room for interpretation to fill. I can't tell if the speaker happened to be in some sort of house fire, or maybe even perhaps a larger fire that affected many people? You don't really clear that up in the poem, it could be metaphorical or literal like niteowl said, but we don't know. This would work better if you gave us a bit of background because I do think that this could be a potentially strong piece, but at the moment, there's nothing that directs us in terms of what this fire is, if it's literal or not, and everything else of that sort. I'm not saying that you have to completely spell it out for the reader, and you shouldn't do that, but I do think that context clues would be useful in this case.
What I mean by that is clues that give context as to what's going on without them having to exactly say this, because I feel like subtlety would mix well with the rest of the poem. I'm also going to tackle the imagery in the poem, and while parts of it are strong, I feel like some of it could potentially be stronger. The line in the first stanza that talks about skin being blistered could be elaborated and expanded on as well as the first couple of lines.
Two good examples of the strong imagery in this poem is the second stanza and the first line of the third stanza. In the second stanza, I think you could change "a blinding light" as well as the third line in it to get a better effect, because the concept is good. Flames that are once small can grow to cause a lot of destruction, is what it seems to tell. The term "written in the soot" in the last stanza is something that gives sensory detail to the poem, which is exactly what it sounds like: details of the senses. If you wanted to grow this, think about how the soot smells, feels like, does it stick to the speaker's fingers? Just some food for thought.
Keep experimenting and writing; I hope I helped and have a great day!
Hi there GalaxyUnicornz! Niteowl here to review this poem!
Overall, I do like some of the images in here. I also like the ending.
My main critique of this poem is that I'm not quite sure if it's describing a literal fire or if it's supposed to be a metaphor for something else. Some of the lines seem to lean towards the "fire as metaphor for passionate relationship" interpretation, which is really cliche, but then some (like seeing the blisters on the skin) feel more literal.
I think this would work better if you built some more context around it. Take us through this scenario, including before the fire and what started it. If it's supposed to be a metaphor, show us what this fire represents. Right now, this has some good stuff, but it kind of feels like flame without a source.
Lastly, I'd like to briefly adjust punctuation. You have none through most of this poem, but there are a couple commas. It makes me wonder if sentence punctuation wouldn't be a better choice. You can learn more about the different methods of punctuation in poetry here: Punctuation in Poetry.
Overall, this has some good imagery, but I'd like it to feel more grounded. Keep writing!