Kneeling, lays brick atop brick carefully.
The sun bites until skin is dry and brown,
But arms endure, persist, stretch out, to see
Walls that touch the blue canopy leave ground.
A benevolent heart compels to do
Kindnesses her duty does not dictate -
Giving days, resources, energy, to
Ensure each corner’s sharp, each tower’s great.
Then, at the right point, her hands pat pat pat
Disheveled towel. Dust storms, swirls, settles.
That hand does not dress the windows and that
Eye does not choose spreads in plum or chartreuse.
We define our minds - affix favored tabs,
She but builds palaces of the raw slabs.
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
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Original Text:
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,861 Reviews
Hello!
First things first, I like how you set up this poem. I love the direct images set up in the short sentences at the beginning and the tone you established as soon as the first line.
One thing I did want to point out is that your poem doesn't have any strength until you get to the fifth line when you have "A benevolent heart" as a character. Before that, it feels like the reader is grasping at nothing. Someone is kneeling, but there is no indication of what it is. I think your poem could benefit from being in first or second person point of view. My recommendation would actually be to use second person because it would still have the same detachment from the poem that you have now. You don't have to, but I think it would make your poem much more amazing.
I love the involvement of the "benevolent heart" and how you can really sense the power in that character. I think your alliteration and personification is amazing and you should continue writing using those literary devices because you're good at them.
I also think your ending was satisfactory, but I also feel like you could alter it to make it as powerful as the rest of the poem.
Overall, I liked this poem and I think you are an amazing poet, but I also think you have the potential to make this poem out of this world.
Keep writing and good luck,
Dianne E.C.E.
Hey. Wisegirl22.
Here, I think "kindnesses" is a bit weird, and can be fit in as "kindness".
"Kindnesses her duty does not dictate -"
That's all. I hope you are on Team Plasma. We need all the help we have. I can't believe we're losing! Anyways, bye, and Happy Review Day to us!
RoyalHighness here to review!
When I first read your poem, I'd forgotten what the title was. When I finished reading and looked back at the title, I grinned from ear to ear. Except for that little bit I mentioned earlier, you did a great job of connecting the concrete idea of a teacher with the abstract ideas that she teaches and you did it all with a graceful flow and sound imagery and lovely diction. Overall, just a great job on the content.
So this was good! I'm not a huge fan of the sonnet as a poetic form, but I think you did a good job here. Let's begin.
Nitpicks
Spoiler
I don't understand this whole bit. The rhyme scheme is all out of whack at this point, and I think you need to re-word this bit (although I know it's hard to re-word a poem when it's all done, but I don't know if I can understand this whole section unless you do.)
I don't understand what a towel has to do with teaching, and what the dust storm is doing and why a hand is dressing windows or why the eye is choosing spreads... Perhaps I'm missing the idea, but I just got lost around there.
This one was also confusing, but less so than the first. I had to read this sentence three or four times before I understood that the walls were the things leaving the ground. But once I got that, I loved the imagery. Great job on varying the sentence structure here, but make sure you don't go too crazy or you'll confuse poor unfortunate souls such as myself.
Content
Spoiler
Conclusion
Your poem was lovely, and you should be proud! For next time, I'd just work on the structure of the lines and getting your points across without sacrificing the flow or meaning of the poem. Overall, I'll give your work a good solid seven stars out of ten! Great job!
Hello, rhia here to review!
I'll do grammar and sentence correction nitpicks first
I don't think you need the last comma in this line. It doesn't really make any sense, and takes away from the flow.
Again here, I don't get why the last comma is there. It's unecessary, and incorrectly placed. I'd cut it out all together.
I don't like the "pat pat pat" bit at all. You have otherwise rather elegant and advanced language, so this sounds incredibly childish. I know it's hard to fit iambic pentameter and the rhyme, but you did really well until this point, which makes this look like a cheap trick. It's definitely worth taking a bit more time time to find something as good as the rest of the poem. Hey, how about "patter that"? It has the same amount of syllables, a similar sound to what you had, the right stresses, and the same end rhyme, but without the childish repetition.
This just sounds weird to me. Why not something like: "Dust storms swirl, settle." so that you have kind of an implied "that" where the comma is?
I love the word chartreuse here, but I'm not really sure how it fits the rhyme scheme.
Okay, things I liked. I really liked this overall, despite the things I pointed out. Your voice is very elegant, just like sonnets should be, if you ask me. Your iambic pentameter had so mistakes that I can see, I though it was very well done, and the beat was steady yet felt natural. Your vocab was awesome; affix, chartreuse, disheveled, benevolent. The entire story had great imagery, and was very interesting. It was very unique, I thought, and I really enjoyed reading it. You really captured a very interesting visual of teachers and their sacrifices. Keep up the good work, and I hope my suggestions help!