Young Writers Society

huh, whirligigs.

In it's brevity, it succeeds. That's the short way to put it. Because I am not the person to talk in short terms, I may as well expand upon that. Though there is only enough space in the poem for one extended metaphor, you make it count. Hurricanes are less common metaphors, I've noticed; they are often outpaced in usage by their tornado cousins. Here, you not only provide such distinctiveness, you add upon it and demonstrate the benevolence of the other person by pointing out that, in spite of the destruction they wreak upon themselves, they have not harmed anyone else. Hence, the other person becomes a self-destructive hurricane, one spiraling through the annals of depression and anger. The poem ultimately ties a metaphor back to a core human emotion and personality trait, capturing the spirit of the other person in few words. I admire the way you expand upon these by noting the calmness of the eyes of the person, just like the eyes of the hurricane. In that way, the hurricane is within him, and projects its beautiful, calm eye out into the world.

Ultimately, there's nothing I can say. It's brief, effective, and beautiful in its message. The other person is tormented, and the narrator's call in the final lines is poignant and sweet. The romantic dynamic is balanced nicely with the depression aspect, and the two combine to form a bittersweet result. Your style is, as ever, perfect, whether in line breaks, its quiet tone, or the distinctive formatting. All in all, I enjoyed reading this poem from start to finish, and I'm happy that you continue to have the inspiration and energy to make these, as I've always enjoyed reading them. Great job!

Hello, Steggy here for a short review!

This is a marvelous poem. The detail, while there isn't much of it, shines through the whole theme you are trying to convey. There are a few things I enjoy but the main one would be the sort of relation to the hurricane you relate to your love. Basically, the comparison of your love for him to a hurricane. Your beginning is very sharp (is that the right word?) and opened the poem nicely and much like the beginning, your ending closes it nicely as well.

A couple things I noticed while I was reading would be there are places where you could make some words important because they are relevant to what is happening. For example, towards the end, you could italicize my tranquil love/find yourself in the disaster because it seems like you're speaking to yourself. The inside voice inside of your head, basically. The same could go for how calm and still/seductive the wind.

Speaking of that stanza, seductive doesn't quite feel like the right word to me. While I think you are comparing his beauty to the winds that swish around you or something, I believe the right word should relate to what is happening in the stanza before or even the opposite of what is happening to kind of show the difference between his actions and whatnot. But then again, the comparison to the wind might be the reason why it seems to be worded weirdly. Perhaps you could do another comparison of some sort.

as the world around him is shorn apart.

mmmmmmmm dELICIOUS

~is going to attempt my first poetry review in forever (?) since I did that poetry review workshop and the Green Room is so close to empty~

~reads poem~

~oh no I can't do this~

~gonna try anyway~

1. I like how short this is. Considering the hurricane metaphor, it could be a lot longer and full of descriptions of hurricanes ripping things apart and whatnot, but you kept it short and simple. The contract of the idea of a "hurricane" and words like "tranquil" is intriguing. The length plus diction gives this poem a feeling of standing in the eye of the storm, which I think might be what you were going for. Especially given the line "I would never not fear him," which I misread the first time but struck me as very powerful when I realized what it said. It's so subtle but it kind of reminds you that there's destruction going on around outside and that it's caused by this storm that you're in the eye of, even if here it seems peaceful.

2. The first two lines had a rhythm that made me think this poem might rhyme (even though a glance at the structure said "probably not"), so it threw me a little because it had this rhythm the rest of the poem didn't have. I think it's something to do with the number of syllables in each line, but I'm not sure. That's not necessarily bad, but it's something to be aware of.

3. The word "spiritual" bothers me. I don't know if it's the context or the fact that we usually say that doing something is "a spiritual experience" rather than just "spiritual" or the fact that "spiritual" is a really vague word in a poem that's already short and without much imagery. Anyway, something about it felt off to me.

And...I think I'm done. So hopefully this helps, a little.