Author's note: Some of these poems were originally posted during NaPoWeek during this Spooktober (with little editing from Kay of this timeline), so don't worry about possible deja-vú effect they may have. Just sayin'.
For Sima
It just hurt to know
that you leave me alone.
No more sister-like friendship,
no more midnight calls
no more secret handshakes
no more anything.
And it hurts even more
because I know
that for you it was short story
and for me the favourite chapter.
Anyways, I don't care.
Create new secret handshake
with someone I don't know.
Create new songs
and sing them alone.
Do what you want,
it was your choice.
I don't care about you,
(I lie to myself everyday)
You were a friend,
but don't come back
asking: ,,It will be like before, right?”
because you already chose the answer.
It won't. Never.
For Laika
Laika, Laika,
good lil’ dog,
dobrý psík,
Хорошая собачка.
Pioneer of space,
human’s loyal friend.
Went up there first,
because we were too scared.
I hope you found the peace
next to the dog star.
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
Possible AI signals:
Original Text:
Are you sure you want to delete this comment? This cannot be undone.
Mark this comment as a review? Points will be awarded to the poster.
Your comment was posted, but it wasn’t long enough to count as a review. Reviews need about four complete sentences (at least 250 characters). Try writing another review that explains your thoughts in more detail — the author will appreciate it, and you’ll earn points for it.
125,027 Literary Works • 672,773 Reviews
I guess this has been around for a while, but you've been reviewing some of my stuff, so I thought I'd check out something of yours!
I really liked the first poem. The second one is nice too, but it doesn't hit the same way as the first one, and I found it a little more ambiguous.
That first poem is great the way it flows. You did well choosing where to break off each line. That's something I struggle with in unstructured poetry. And I feel that the sentiment was conveyed well, too. The narrator (whether that's you or someone else) expresses thoughts that might be common in a friend break-up.
I think my favorite lines were:
"I know that for you
it was a short story
and for me a favorite chapter."
That is super relatable. I think it encapsulates exactly the feeling that comes with realizing someone in your life was more special to you than you evidently were to them. I'm guessing most of us have been there.
All in all, great work, and don't shy away from trying poetry more!
Heya Winny, thank you for leaving a review!
These are neat! I hope you try out NaPo this April - I like how you played with formatting and rooted your poetry to specific images too. Nice reads.
Hello Kay! Lim here with a review.
For Sima
This was a sad poem - there was evidently a lot of heartbreak there! I read into it a motif of ‘stories’ - “chapter” and “short story” are used as metaphors to describe how the speaker/narrator and Sima viewed their friendship, and the ending lines refer to “choice” - and to me I think of stories as being about choices.
Something I liked was the changes in tone between the stanzas. The first stanza had a sadder tone, with the speaker using words like “hurt” and focusing on what they have lost (the “sister-like friendship”, “midnight calls” and “secret handshakes”). The second stanza seems to change to an angrier tone using imperatives like “Create new songs” and “Do what you want”. I thought marking the tone change by starting a new stanza made the shape of the poem match the speaker’s emotions. It makes me wonder how the poem would feel if the tones were in reverse, i.e. the angry stanza first and the sad stanza after?
Something to consider might be the line breaks here:
Is there a reason why the second line stops at “back”? I felt like having “asking” be on the same line would be easier to read, but maybe there’s an effect you want to get there?
And just a grammar note for that same section - “choose” has an irregular past tense, so in this context we’d usually say “you already chose the answer” or “you’ve already chosen the answer”.
Another thing I liked about this poem is how you repeated some of the structures:
Repeating the “no”s here helps emphasise the emotion I think and conveys how much the speaker has lost from what the addressee has done, so their anger in the next stanza makes sense.
For Laika
This poem was also sad, knowing the story of Laika, but it had a different voice and tone from the previous poem. The tone here is more mournful and reflective, and the first stanza definitely feels like it’s addressed to a dog. The second stanza feels more addressed to humans in general and has a bit of a critical tone in the last line.
Something I liked was the rhythm. Even though the first stanza incorporates different languages, I felt like the flow of the lines didn’t break and seemed to match the rhythm of the second stanza. They both seem to have 3 lines of similar length and end with a slightly longer 4th line.
Something I thought about when reading was the line “Went up there”. It makes it sound like Laika made the decision to go to space on her own somehow - whereas from my understanding it was more like she was sent to space by people? Not sure if that was intentional, but it was just something I noticed so I thought I’d bring it up.
One grammar note: I don’t think you need the “as” in “as first” - I think “Went up there first” would work just as well.
Overall, I’m always glad to see you getting into poetry! I like how you’ve played with tone in both of these poems, and they do seem very fitting for autumn, which I associate with endings and melancholy themes.
Hope this helps, and keep writing!
Heya! Sorry for super late answer >.<, but thank you so much for taking time to write this review! I always like to hear which emotions do people associate with my works and I'm glad to hear that those poems have the vibe I wanted them to have. Thank you for your notes about grammar and everything, I will definitely do some little rewritings!
Hi Kay! I'm here to leave a short review!
I have to say, I loved both of these. They were both really enjoyable to read and I love the style and how it makes the words more impactful. Anyways, onto the review...
This stanza alone carried so much weight, it showed the pain and grief of losing a good friend, and reminiscing of all the memories together. Your words were really powerful, especially with the repetition and placement of line break, as that was really well done too. I also loved how you said "that for you it was short story and for me the favourite chapter", I thought that really brought out the message of something temporary and separate versus something part of the story, part of life. And that was really cool in describing friendship not as a side story but something to build off of, something to grow from.
I love the choice of formatting it this way, it shows the separation that has happened between what used to be and the present. This stanza was also really powerful, the words really hit hard, and with repetition again. I liked that you said “(I lie to myself everyday)” that really put into perspective a sort of split personality, one caring and one not, and the use of parentheses shows it as being something you’re maybe hiding. I would even suggest that you could extend the use of parentheses and have other instances where it is used to represent the other side of you that cares, and it might add more depth to this meaning. Also, super small but I think you meant to say “because you already chose the answer” (dw English is kinda weird tbh).
This was a great way to end the poem. It left the reader with a powerful statement to think about and stated what you really meant plainly.
This poem was really powerful overall! The only think I would say you can do to improve it is maybe extending that short story/chapter metaphor and just metaphors in general, because I liked that metaphor and adding more would definitely benefit the poem and extend the meaning.
It's really cool how you said "good dog" in three different languages. It not only gives it more emphasis and shows that you really mean it, but maybe shows a connection across languages, and that she was so deeply connected to humans.
This stanza also shows the human-dog connection, and saying "because we were too scared" honors her bravery and courage for going into space. How you wrote her here had her sound as an equal to humans, almost as if she were a person too, which I think is a really poetic statement to make.
I am sort of unsure what this part means, but I think it brought the poem good closure nonetheless. Ending by hoping the best for her future in the stars was a nice ending.
I liked this poem too, even though it was short. I think it really honored her and was a beautiful tribute to her.
Both poems gave beautiful and painful messages about human and animal nature. I hope I can read more of your poetry in the future! Keep writing!
- Ant
Heya Ant! Thank you very much for finding time to write this great review! (I%u2019ll definitely fix the grammar error!)
That part about dog star is referring to Sirius, %u201Ca dog star%u201D. Laika went %u201Cup to stars%u201D so I thought that making that reference would be good. I hope it makes sense! ^^
You're welcome! Ah, I see, that makes sense.