Young Writers Society

Thank you for sharing your beautiful poem, Kazeybear. I thought it was absolutely lovely and really touched my heart.

Heyo! SilverBerry is here for a review. To be honest, I don't think there are many errors in your poem, and I loved your rhymes and the mood throughout the story. I liked the way your words flowed well like the waves you wrote about.

If I may make a suggestion, in the fifth line you write;
"Don't let them pull you in, dear," -nice line, but I don't really like the comma before "in" and "dear", it seems like the dear is too abrupt if that makes any sense. Perhaps you can say "Don't let them pull you in, MY dear", and then you would have some nice repetition with "my darling" in the seventh line. Up to you of course.

Slight technical issue that the tenth line has no punctuation yet the eleventh starts with a capital letter. I think you should add a comma after "water".

In the fourteenth line you have a slight error in which I believe you switch tenses with the "and yet you will find no help" (I must admit I'm not the best with tenses) I'm pretty sure the "will" is not supposed to be there, and it also makes the flow a bit awkward.

Finally, you rhyme the word "pressures" and "precious" but they're technically not rhymes so it kind of ruins your rhyme scheme.

Anyways that's it and it's completely up to you if you want to take my advice or not. I really loved how you ended the poem the same way you started, it was a very nice end to your wonderful work. I hope to read more of your writing soon!

Hello! I'm spectator and I'm going to review your poem.

Now, normally I dislike poetry that rhymes. I find that rhyming can be very restrictive to the message a poet is trying to get across. That being said, I really enjoyed this poem and you executed the rhyming very nicely (wow this is the second poem that rhymes that I've read and liked in the past 24 hours. i would not be surprised if the universe started contracting right about now). The rhyming made this poem flow well, but since every single line didn't rhymed it wasn't too overwhelming. So, kudos to you for writing a good poem that rhymes. That isn't easy!

Here's a few suggestion...

1) I felt like these lines flowed weirdly "Your lungs fill with water / Dying from the inside out" I think the problem is that they are not long enough. If you added a couple of words (not more than one or two) to these lines I think that would help a lot. Also, try reading this poem aloud to better hear how different part flows. I have found this can be very helpful.

2) Throughout this poem you established a tone of helplessness and paralysis very effectively. However, I think you could build more on the relationship between the narrator and the "child". The only exhibit of the compassion between them is the pet names the narrator uses for the child like "dear" and "my darling". If you show how much the narrator loves the child it will make the narrator's distress over the child drowning so much more potent. And then the tone will be even more helpless! Yay!

3) Now, there was only one part of the poem I really disliked. That was these four lines "The sea, of course, is your life. / The waves, they are your pressures. /Do you value how you live?/ Do you hold your life as precious" In these lines you effectively break the fourth wall and tell your readers the meaning of you poem. To me this is the equivalent of having to explain a joke. This makes the joke less funny, just as telling your readers the meaning of your poem makes it less interesting. You should leave your readers to come to the realization on their own, so these lines really aren't necessary, in fact I think they detract from the poem.

Other than that this poem is really great!!! I hope you find my suggestions helpful! Keep up the good work, write lots! Have a fantastic day!

~ spectator

Hey there. Jonathan here to review your poem.

I really love this. You have this really haunting tone that kept me engaged-- and honestly a little scared -- throughout the piece. I love your last four lines and that refrain ("the sea can swallow, child / or don't you understand?'). Really great work with this one. In fact, you did such a good job that I won't list three things for you to improve on, I'll just mention a few lines I think you could change.

"Don't let them pull you in, dear, / with their large and frothy claws." ~ "Large" here feels clinical. I'd go with another, richer adjective.

"The current sweeps you under, / your lungs fill with water." ~ I think this is a little awkward because for a second I thought you were trying to rhyme "under" with "water" and that would have disrupted the rhyme scheme.

"a very ruthless slaughter." ~ There's nothing wrong with this line-- just a personal preference. It seems a little short to me, and I'm hearing it stop off the rhythm.

"For sea creatures do not know, / as you sink towards the kelp." ~ Again, this disrupts the rhythm, and I think it's the comma in the first line. If you wrote this out as a sentence it wouldn't have a comma and here it's a little awkward having one. I understand the need for a comma after every line as a stylistic choice, but here it doesn't work and wouldn't work in a prose sentence, either. Anyway: great work, Kazey! This is your best yet. Keep writing and I'll keep reviewing!

Jonathan