Warning: This work has been rated 16+.
one
when i was a kid i lived in a cardboard house and my mother helped me draw flowers that lived in the pretend window boxes. i watered them with my plastic watering can and they were pink and green and blue and orange, the most beautiful colors i couldn't think of. and i didn't notice when she faded away and bit her lip in her empty room. my big brother thought it was funny to tackle my cardboard house, and the old refrigerator box collapsed under his nine year old feet, and i cried tears and watched the crayon flowers jump to life under my eyelashes.
two
and for years now i've had no place to sleep, because every cardboard house i build gets torn apart, or even worse, burned from lips that were rough and vodka that was too strong. i've gotten used to the sound of my feet when i'm running from the scene and i've gotten used to the smell of cardboard daisies pushing up through concrete. those goddamn things are strong and they follow me, and i think everyone's wrong, they're weeds, not harmless flowers. they've rooted in my brain and make sure i can't sleep.
three
my mother is a faded house dress that sits in the corner of her kitchen and i don't understand why it smells moldy when she should be very much alive, but peanut butter taped her mouth shut and no matter how hard i try her jaw tightens and i don't know how to tell her i'm sorry.
my brother's meaty hands destroyed more than my first cardboard house. he huffed and puffed and tore down my mother's too. and she never saw her daisies push through her kitchen floor, 'cause i pulled them up and carried them off before she could.
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125,020 Literary Works • 672,733 Reviews
Okay so some of this 'poem' dragged on a bit and didn't flow. It felt like sentences just ran on without a stop and that's bad because poetry is about eloquence and the way it rolls off the tongue, but here it's just written and put onto the page with little care. You don't really have to have line breaks but they help, and so does punctuation.
Now I understand the poem is not about the colors, flowers, moldy smells ect. but you put it on the page in a way that didn't tell a vivid story. The best example is the "smells moldy," I don't know how to interpret this because I don't know what mold smells like, and for many people it will be different. It is much better to describe the smell using descriptive words instead because then the reader doesn't have to guess and interpret what you mean by the particular thing. Below I listed some examples that would be better to show the reader concisely what you mean instead of tell them a round about example;
the most beautiful colors i couldn't think of.
i didn't notice when she faded away and bit her lip in her empty room
flowers jump to life under my eyelashes
it smells moldy
What are the most beautiful colors? What does the empty room look like, what do you mean faded away (literally or figuratively or in your mind)? What do you mean by the flowers jumping to life? Did they get up and walk?
It should be more concise so it doesn't lead to confusion or ambiguity; if you tell the story exactly then the message should be easier to digest.
And lastly,
he huffed and puffed and tore down
This just does not work for you, at all.
Trust me when I tell you it's good, but it can be better.
Hallo! Retro here for a review :3
Well I say review more of a comendation. This is superb and beautiful and love every aspect of it. This is frankly one of the best poems i've read here, and you've got a real nice poetic voice in the piece.
My only criticism would be in 'one' you say couldn't and i'm not entirely sure it should be a negative.
But other than that this is an oustanding piece of poetry.
Seriously, well done.
~Retro
<3 thank you
Wow, Spark, this is fab!
At first glance, I thought that "pretend" wasn't needed, and just kind of hindered the feel there, but then I figured that "pretend" was quasi-necessary because if you just said window boxes, the window boxes could be real. It would be ideal if a different word than pretend was inserted there, as pretend doesn't seem to be quite the right word there.I got shivers near the end-- your imagery is really nice, and I like how everything comes together at the end. Gosh, it's just, great!
Now, I don't usually review prose poetry, as it's not a specialty of mine (I get too rambly when I write prose poetry), so you'll have to bear with me if I say, "I think you should do this!" When that's not a convention of prose poetry.
But I digress.
Though I really like this poem, there were a few things that stood out for me in the "needs improvement" category.
I was a little confused by this, and thought it was a typo at first, but I thought I'd let you know, in case it was a typo. If not, carry on, my wayward Spark.
You give the mother "faded" twice as a description. Perhaps in the first one, you could say she "drifted" to the other room or something? I really really like the second one the way it is, but I don't think you should use the same adjective for the same person twice in the same poem.
This is a bit redundant. Perhaps word this sentence differently? I understand that the crayon flowers are blurring from tears, and that feeling should remain, but "cried tears" isn't really the best way to go about it in this instance.
I understand that you're using parallel structure and stream of consciousness, but you have to break the rules sometimes to create interest. I suggest saying ", watching" here.
Personally, I like to avoid "that were", but that's a personal preference, I suppose. If I were you, I'd write "burned from rough lips and overpowering vodka." Perhaps even make the vodka into the smell of vodka, such as "and the overpowering reek of vodka."
I love this image, but I want more. What is the sound of your feet? Is it the slap of wet sneakers on pavement? The polished click of high heels on the parking lot? The small squeaks of tennis shoes on hardwood? Tell me more about the sound. Also, "scene" sounds strange to me here. I'd find a different word.
I haven't been too picky about punctuation because of the stream of consciousness thing you've got going on here, but I think you need a semi-colon after wrong because the realization afterwards warrants some type of heralding punctuation to make the realization stronger. If that makes sense. Also, I'm not a big fan of "harmless" here because I'm pretty sure everyone gets the distinction between weeds and flowers. Sometimes, though, it is difficult to tell the difference between weeds and wildflowers. Take asters for example. Many people think it is a weed, but it is a wildflower. If you put "wildflower" in there, the difference will be much more subtle and easy to understand the mistakes people made.
I suggest you connect these two sentences with a semi colon because they're related ideas, and I feel like a pause rather than a full stop should be made in the middle of those two.
Altogether, I really loved this. Beautiful. I hope this review proves useful to you! Happy poeting!