"I don't deserve peace,"
I believed so nonchalantly.
After failing ordeals unnecessary
And regaining wisdom that I disowned,
I am back at the hills where uncertainty
Origins, to later tumble down, like stones.
Everything that is born here is born in three,
A superposition of many forking paths,
The camera rolls but time defies, one frame lingers,
Apples and berries will feed me till I'm ready.
Retraced phantom voices will be my phalanx, once again,
"Everyone is entitled to a semblance of taciturn serenity,"
"You believe this," "Unless you have forsaken yourself,
Your own personhood, you will not deny yourself peace."
I fracture into two, and three, then a million visions
Of who I want to be, until I snap back, glued together
By a desire to be nothing more than a ghostly seamstress,
Capable of piercing stony hearts and re-attaching dreams.
Leaves fall patiently over the edge, the hills summon gusts
To wave goodbye old friends, they are pushed along, gently,
Towards of a valley of thorns, dusk-red leaves glide and glisten,
Tears stored over ten thousand years will hasten their rust.
Everyone who was born here encourages me to journey,
A couple of crows, a blind dog, an apple tree and a vine,
"May you never return," the retriever prays with a smile,
I leap, because my demons deserve respite and so do I.
A jubilant howl, the honor winds of Kest-Elin are summoned,
At first they are chilly, cold enough to stop an Olympian's heart,
"Thorns below are far too fiery," warns a contour in the breeze,
So I let the guards carry me out as they please.
Leaves fall thoughtless, all around me,
I wish them the best and persevere.
Finally, I land and stand in the midst of a valley that burns all,
But I remain unscathed, for as long as my friends will it so,
At the foot of uncertainty lies a divorce
Of the known and the unknown.
A contour tells, "Endeavor to find the root of ignorance and lunacy,"
"Only if you succeed will your respite solidify and become everlasting."
And so I begin, to navigate the chasms of Kest-Elin.
Points:
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Canary word: Present
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125,027 Literary Works • 672,768 Reviews
Hi there! Happy revmo month. As a fellow fantasy writer and someone who dabbled in poetry this caught my eye. I cant believe it sunk into the green room for so long. But I guess it's lucky for me!
I love the voice from the first line. It give apathy and indifference. But it does feel contradicted immediately by "regaining wisdom", unless he has done terrible things, although that is not implied by "ordeal unnecessary ". The last two lines confuse me. I read them multiple times and to me it doesn't fel like a complete sentence. My brain is screaming that there is a word that goes after "uncertainty ".
I feel like this speaks to a lot of things. For me, it makes me think of all the art and hobbies i want to create and try, and in the end it's easier to focus on just one, or give up entirely and shrink away.
This line stood out to me because it seems to be one of many contradictions that the narrator has. Earlier we see dusk-red leaves rusting with tears, but then here leaves are spoken of as if they mean nothing.
Just absolutely love this line.
I love the mythology here, the age that can be felt, even before we are told ten thousand years of tears are stored up. It feels very fitting to be reading it as fall approaches.
I love the indecision and tug-of-war that possesses the narrator. Its like they both want this change, but are also afraid and unsure of what they are doing or why they are doing it.
And then at the end we understand the goal and are given a clear purpose for pursuing answers, so that all this effort isnt in vain.
I won't pretend to be the best at reading into poems. I noticed the repetition of apples, leave, and contours, and it made me wonder if theu signify something greater. I love that the voice within the story doesn't try to explain the world, because it already knows it within the setting. We are just catching a glimpse of an individual's pilgrimage.
~Messy
I love how this is written - it reminds me of lot of epic poetry I had to read this year in literature studies! From the beginning, you take us on a journey written in verse and I really enjoyed reading this!
I don't really have time to write a review, but I thought that I could at least write a comment to let you know that I enjoyed your poem 
Hello Meherazul! Lim here with a review for your poem.
This poem leaves me feeling transported. I interpret the story of the poem as being about a person who decides to undertake an internal journey (along with an external one), which is why they want to “find the root of ignorance and lunacy” for the sake of inner peace. The poetic voice is really intriguing. I also really enjoy the surreal, yet fairy-tale-like atmosphere of this place on the hills, where all the creatures speak to the narrator.
Something I like about your writing is how you combine different kinds of imagery, such as in:
“Fracture” and “snap back” play off the film metaphor from an earlier stanza (“camera rolls”), but “ghostly seamstress” links that back to the fantasy aspect. I think it’s really fitting too since both movies and sewing involve stitching things into a cohesive whole
The imagery is also vivid and paints a picture in my head. With images like “dusk-red leaves glide and glisten,” I could really picture these hills as having a mysterious, otherworldly appearance. The colour red also crops up a lot with apples being featured repeatedly, as well as the idea of “fiery” thorns and a valley “that burns all”. The connotations with red that are evoked here (like vibrance, abundance, but also destruction) contrast the gentleness of the wind, making the scene really interesting.
Some questions I have for you are:
The poem feels very ‘dense’ with lots of imagery and suggestions packed in. As a result, some of the lines feel very mysterious! For me, that makes the poem more intriguing but also leaves me wondering what the context is for some of the lines. “Retraced phantom voices will be my phalanx, once again,” – who are these “phantom voices”? Have they always been there in Kest-Elin? Are they people that the narrator/speaker knows personally (like the creatures and wind on the hills seem to be), or strangers that haunt the place?
As mentioned, I noticed that apples appear in multiple places throughout the poem. Is there a special significance to that?
What role does rhyming play for you in this poem? I noticed most of the poem is unrhymed with the exception of:
Another thing I like about this piece: It seems to be both the beginning of someone’s journey but also a journey in itself, as the speaker goes from not wanting to seek their own peace to deciding to seek it. When I’ve tried to write fantasy-inspired poems myself, I’ve often struggled to make a single short poem *work* despite it being embedded in a larger setting. I think you’ve managed to accomplish that here by focusing on one change that the speaker undergoes and letting the setting fall out naturally from that character arc.
Overall, this poem works well in conveying the speaker’s change in attitude, and how their friends on the hills play a role in that, while being a nice window into a larger fantasy world.
Hope this helps, and keep writing!
-Lim