Young Writers Society

Honestly, I am always astonished by how great you can write poems! So let’s review it

I like the writing style a lot, the use of vagueness let us reader’s imaginations run wild and picture head scenarios about what is going on and how these two people had parted.
The page you stated, it made me as a reader think of a fictional character. It made me imagine a reader loving, adoring, longing for a fictional character who doesn’t exist, yet suffered a loss.

(Your writing style kinda reminded me of Tahereh Mafi :3 I love that)

this is good and the vagueness comes across very well. i do think you have some superfluous phrasing, but that can be easily fixed in a little bit of workshopping. you've just got some "extra" that I think could be parsed down to make your core imagery more clear. some examples of this is the "cards and coffee" at the end of the first line. It doesn't really *add* to it, it just muddies the water and distracts from what's really good in the line— the image of smoking in the summer rain under a no smoking sign.

Also, you've got a lot of "and's" going on throughout the entire poem. I would cut almost all of them (or just go for it and get rid of every single one that's not completely grammatically necessary). In my experience, "and" is almost never necessary in poetry and almost always makes the imagery more passive. I would challenge you to try and write some poems this NaPo that don't have any "extra" words (and/because/but etc) and see how it changes. I think it could really teach you some things about the way you structure your phrasing.

one little edit I thought of while reading is to get rid of the "i never knew how soon" in stanza one. again, i feel like this stanza is just a little too cluttered and removing that line might help a little bit. I would also cut "I will never meet" in stanza two. You're elaborating a lot of lines that don't really need elaboration because you've already set such a clear, beautiful image.

my favorite stanza is stanza two. I love it. so so so good.

nix the "and" at the beginning of stanza three. and also in line 3. Also the "because" in the second to last line (see my earlier comments about passivity!).

this is lovely. you've done a great job setting a scene that is nostalgic and reflective. with a little workshoping, this could be utterly incredible. Let me know if you want to work through it, or if you want to talk more about superfluous phrasing with ands/becauses. I really struggled with the concept for a really long time and found how powerful my writing could be when I actively worked to cut down on that type of wording/phrasing. I could really see that being a big step for you as a poet in your writing. I'd love to chat more about it, so just shoot me a PM or send me a pad link anytime!


Spark