Let’s say we’re playing truth or dare, minus the dare. Here’s a truth:
the bedtime stories I used to tell you weren’t so much about rescues
or heroics as they were about the way your smiles condensed like
the bars of a cage around my heart, or how the bruises you forgot to
hide come evening made of the sunset some distant angel’s wings.
Surely there is a word for this; in the dictionary it must stand between
fragile and implicit, unless perhaps it is indexed under love; unconditional.
Truth: I think your name nests in the tender nets of my capillaries, and
behind my eyelids there is always the flutter of your little-girl skirts,
in my ears the echo of your voice spelling out fairytales and numbers.
I could write an encyclopedia out of your silences. Yesterday, when the
horizon burned, you were in my arms painted in shades of dawn,
so light it felt as though you were only a doll I would have made out
of volcanic stones and little bird bones. Truth: I was terrified I was not
holding you closely, or gently, or carefully, enough, and—
I do not believe there is a word that would enclose all that you are
when you stand on the sidewalk and wave smiling at me, through the
car’s windows and the widening distances between you and me; nor is
there one for the feeling that settles when at night the clouds breathe
with the rise and fall of your chest and my shadow sinks over the doorway.
This is not something I will ever tell you: there is weight enough on the
fragile scaffolds of your shoulders and in the hollows of your spine;
but if there is a word, in any language, for the way your eyes shine when
you stand dragonfly-bright on the balcony with your arms spread and my heart
is strung raw and stuttering in the expectancy of a dive into the light, it
is not one I ever want to know.
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Canary word: Present
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125,007 Literary Works • 672,816 Reviews
Alright, so, I had me review done, and the site did that thing.
Okay, so let me re do this.
I seriously, really loved this. Your senses of emotion and character were strong, and always there, and I truly felt it.
Your poem had a nice flow and it really, all just connect. Which is awesome.
I love your first stanza, especially your first line. it really pulled me in, which is what it was supposed to do.
good work
~WickedWonder
Unfortunately, I am no good at reviewing poetry. But I wanted to mention that I thought this was beautiful and evocative and the title you chose fits nicely.
Great piece, beautiful writing,
Tanya
This is great. At first glance it looked kind of intimidating because of how long the lines were, and I figured they were too long to work, but you did a great job and it managed to keep its flow the whole time. It was solid, through the whole thing, and I wish I had more to say.
Keep writing,
StoryWeaver
My dear Jags.
You're getting better and better.
However, there's one issue that arises in this. And that is that you take metaphors, words etc, and don't continue them or lead up to them. Very few of your metaphors are fleshed out and some words come out of nowhere.
This is an absolutely gorgeous line. And I don't want you to change it, but "dragonfly-bright" I feel there needs to be some lead up to it. Even just a tiny mention of it, to pack some punch behind this line.
I like to think of poetry as a web, everything is connected in some way or another, but you want to make those connections strong otherwise, the web falls apart. And things that feel sudden or unrelated shake the web in a threatening way.
You've got yourself an interesting predicament. You have lines that are like the dewdrops on the web, absolutely lovely, but they're shaking the web. You want to weave it in more, but I suggest you weave around it and not touch those line, think of it as hacking up something else for the diamonds.
As for your metaphors, you play with them, stick it under the readers nose and take it back because you aren't too sure about it. You want to run your metaphors home. Of course, I'm not very good at this either so I shouldn't be talking : P
But yes, what happens to the birds at the end, where'd they go? The only idea you've chugged through to the end is the concept of words. Otherwise, everything was left back in the third stanza.
Please stop improving this quickly or I may run out of things to say, and then I'll be out of business.
And for you:
Spoiler
Kamas
Ah Jagged what we have here is a very interesting piece, interesting how you ask? Well it seems to be about a deadly obsession, something loilita like, the kind the person could get arrested for. And the way you wrote it about a truth or dare game -- it gives it a whole new layer and theme, it's easily to convey this sorta taboo in such generic way about how it's bad or what not, but from the point of view of the actual person, it intrigues me.
I shall explain further, many the time with these sort of poems people chicken out on the actual context of them and go instead something less disturbing. It's admirable you chose not to and it truly shows. For instance how it's in prose form adds something, it makes it seem like he's writing a twisted diary of his voyeuristic voyage --- it's my guess he's a neighbour or someone she trusts. Perhaps it's a relative as she comes to him when hurt or her, see we're not fully sure of the gender another great move on your part, all we're sure of is this. They want her, they need her, they obsess about her. It's without a doubt you capture such feelings so intricately using a 'Teen and Children game' it adds a sense of innocence, people playing Truth and Dare tend to hate getting truth, whereas Dare wasn't so bad, it was just something stupid or funny or in older cases kiss the same gender or what not. Sorry deviating. I don't think this poem would have worked with another game as this one. Now what stanza I loved was obviously this one:
I love this stanza how it relates to writing, how they describe the beauty of this person, even going so far as to compare them to a toy, something you could break. The person seems to be aware of how they are, I like that, it makes it even more foreboding and shows they will have no regrets.
I've one minor suggestion, nothing too big but I think it'd amp up the creepy and it could work for last stanza add in a dare, like they finally dare to what they want, ending on that idea would just be plain creepy. Maybe not thing going for but I feel it would work.
Overall: There is much about this poem I love, it's very dark and almost tragic in some senses, but also horrific, it's like a black comedy, you know what this person wants but the idea they're using a game to convey this makes it kinda of erringly funny. It's a superbly crafted piece and truly creepy.
Hope this helps.
Wow! This is awesome. It is the type of poetry that you would expect to find in a book. I love your use of figurative language.I envy you right now. Keep writing because your writing is beautiful. Fiction
Either very good poetry or horrendous poetry will bring me out of the woodwork, and I think you know enough about yourself to figure out which one this is.
This is very strong.
Spoiler
This is a wonderful poem. The word choice and way you string it along together—effortlessly—is excellent. The last stanza especially; "dragonfly bright", "strung raw", this is impressively done. Most striking with this poem is how it flows. I began to read in my head, and then went back, muted my music, and read it aloud, as if slam poetry. It seems well-suited for that use. Perhaps you should explore that! My issues with this poem lie mainly along two separate but related lines. I think there are several occasions in which individual lines or sentence take too long. In several places, greater attention to clarity is needed, in others, the sentence doubles back upon itself or digresses. As ever, omit needless words. The second issue is that I think the poem does not do a good enough job of coming to a point. The poem flirts with this metaphor of words, but it never seemed fully fleshed out, or entirely convincing. Greater allusion to this in the first two stanzas would likely correct this problem. It might solve my overall issue as well, but it might not. Is there a line in this poem that encapsulates the poem's message? I didn't find it, and perhaps it should be there. Consider that. If poems are like pencils, then I would put this one back in the sharpener for a moment or two.
A final question; is there a real reason for why the title is not capitalized?
This poem is amazing. I love this poem. It was a bit confusing at some parts what you where talking about. I think that you should look a bit more closely at your sentences, try using periods more then comma's. If your not sure whether to put a period or a comma here's a tip, "When in doubt leave it out." I know this review is not very helpful, but I'm not good at writing reviews yet. I hope it helped.