It’s prying on your mem’ries,
It’s beckoning you on,
The shadows of a nightmare
Will call out from beyond.
These softly glowing feathers,
They’re trapped in minds of youth,
And having bars of envy,
Take trem’bling steps uncouth.
The purest shard of amber
Turned coal with bitter rage,
A world of tar and ashes,
The ripping of a page.
And when the night commences,
The oceans hold their breath,
The guiding star you follow
Will lead you to your death.
But if you turn away,
Try to escape the gloom,
An iridescent flower
Will in your mind take bloom.
It will dispel the darkness,
Uproot it like a tree,
Will cut down every shadow,
And you will finally be free.
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Hello, darling! Let's settle into this.
The first set of four lines isn't a complete sentence; if you were going for fragments in any case, then the first set is actually a fusion of two fragments, which I personally find confusing. The second one is made up of two fused full sentences, which means that the comma after "breath" should be a semicolon instead.To begin, I'd like to say that even if your punctuation is technically correct, I find it to be the most distracting element of this piece. The reader is already going to pause at the end of the line, and because your lines are so short to begin with, it's like a double-dose of commas. You don't have punctuation at the end of every line, thank goodness, but it's enough that it is extremely noticeable and it actually made the piece a little difficult for me to read.
Actually, taking a second look at a lot of your punctuation, it's not correct. There are spots where you should have ended sentences and spots where you should have kept going because the sentence was incomplete, but I think you were going for kind of a four-line stanza set without stanza breaks in-between. I can see what you aimed at, but I can also see what you hit—take these stanza sets, for example:
I think my main problem with this piece is that it doesn't carry images all the way through. Your images feel very much one-off, with little tying them together—what is the correlation between pure amber to coal, or the oceans and the guiding star, or the iridescent flower? What reason do they have for being there? Why did you use those images instead of something more cohesive? You have feathers, stars, oceans, trees, rocks, and the only thing tying them together is that they're all natural things being given unnatural properties—but there's nothing more to them.
Overall, I think that the lines and syntax could use some heavy editing and rewriting, and the images could use a good tweak so they at least line up with one another in terms of importance. As it is, you seem to be picking up one image and then casting it away just as quickly; you have an image for every stanza set, and the reader is going to have a spot of trouble figuring out how to relate those to the poem as a whole, since there seems to be little to no correlation to their position in the poem, or the words you use, or the thoughts you're displaying. Keep writing!
Sorry, double post....
Hey, dbrick here for a quick review. I knew this was an excellent poem before I even started really analyzing it. Your simple rhyming scheme, descriptions, and word use are great! I definitely admire how you were able to string together random things (a guiding star, shard of amber, tar and ashes, an iridescent flower, etc.) from a nightmare together in a way that is fluid and connected. Overall great poem, I look forward to reading more of your writing.
Very well done. Perfect description of what a nightmare does to the mind. I can honestly say I remember nearly every nightmare I have ever had. I loved the rhythm put into this poem thought as some points it seemed a little off, closer to the end, I think. Examples:
But if you turn away,
Try to escape the gloom,
An iridescent flower
And:
Uproot it like a tree,
Will cut down every shadow,
And you will finally be free.
I only found the second line of the first bit, and the last line of the poem to throw off the rhythm a bit. I think this is because of the amount of syllables you have in these lines. You have a pattern throughout your poem with syllables. This is your pattern (the numbers at the side of each line will be the amount of syllables you have in each line):
It’s prying on your mem’ries, (7)
It’s beckoning you on, (6)
The shadows of a nightmare (7)
Will call out from beyond. (6)
These softly glowing feathers, (7)
They’re trapped in minds of youth, (6)
And having bars of envy, (7)
Take trem’bling steps uncouth. (6)
The purest shard of amber (7)
Turned coal with bitter rage, (6)
A world of tar and ashes, (7)
The ripping of a page. (6)
And when the night commences, (7)
The oceans hold their breath, (6)
The guiding star you follow (7)
Will lead you to your death. (6)
But if you turn away, (6)
Try to escape the gloom, (6)
An iridescent flower (7)
Will in your mind take bloom. (6)
It will dispel the darkness, (7)
Uproot it like a tree, (6)
Will cut down every shadow, (7)
And you will finally be free. (8)
As you can see, in the parts that I pointed out, they either have too little syllables or too many, throwing off the rhythm of the poem just enough to notice. It isn't a bad thing. I find it incredibly hard to try to get everything in when I limit myself to a certain number of syllables, but I also find that it is very helpful and beneficial to the poem.
All in all, not bad. Very nice poem, meaningful and to the point. Can't wait to read more of your poems! I know I will enjoy them.
Hey there! I decided to look at some of your other poetry, and I'm glad I did! I like the descriptions you gave, and that you correctly shortened memories and trembling, people don't really know how to do that anymore. Your flow is very natural, it was very easy to read. The main thing I'm unsure about is if you have a set rhyming pattern, because most of the time you're rhyming, but then there are certain lines that don't and it kind of disrupts the poem a little once you notice it. So I would recommend fixing that, unless that was a purposeful thing you did. Just fix the beginning if you don't agree with anything else, because I immediately sensed that you were trying to rhyme, but only two out of the four introductory lines rhymed (and "on" and "beyond", though similar, don't rhyme in the true sense of the word, so maybe find a different word or something there?) and I had to pause for a second, and then go on. And pausing, unless it is pausing to cry at the emotionalness, or laugh at a joke, is NOT good. Because if the reader is not emotionally reacting to the literature, then he/she is questioning the legitimacy of what he/she is reading, as I've observed at least. So there is that to think about, which is all I have to say, because other than rhyming pattern, this is AWESOME. So keep writing poetry (and other things as well.)
Thank you for the review!
I'm still trying to understand the deeper meaning of poetry. I have a friend who loves poetry but when she shows it to me I don't understand. Then she explains it to me and I see the deeper meaning and how beautiful it really is. Or sometimes how it shows deep personal encounters. Or you just express your feelings. Could you please leave a short description for me?
I don't know what I was talking about very well myself, but A lot of it had to do with the hope that you can still find even when everything looks black and hopeless.
Your grammar is very spot on, and I didn't catch any mistakes. The diction you used is very nice. Not the standard, elementary word usage, and this was very refreshing. I did find a few things that could be fixed however. Just a few things:
Cliches were something that you brushed against in this poem, make sure that you avoid these. I prefer reading poems that are broke up into stanzas, but here it works for you to have it in this format. Good luck and keep writing!
~Kay
WOAH! Amazing <3
Flawless.
That was a great poem
it was really deep and cool. The use of adjectives was beautiful and created great imagery. This was really great and I really enjoyed reading it 
I really thought is was a really good poem 
~MindBlown
Haha you used really a lot XD
beat you to the review
Hahaha yeah I saw that
and force of habit
Thank you so much!
Can I just say WOAH! Not very poetic advice like I know but it's accurate. The only thing I suggest is prehaps breaking it up into stanzas so it's not just one long thing. That makes it easier to read and more visually attractive. I tend to read individual stanza's fast so I had to read this poem a couple times to grasp the idea. I really love it and your rhyming is totally epic! Once again not the whole mystical ue the force kind of advice here but it's all true. Your vocabulary is astonishing truly! Uncouth is not a word I find many people use very often, nor is iridescent. Watch your punctuation though because I caught a couple minor slip ups but nothing major and certainly nothing compared to the mistakes I make XD
Really truly poetic and passionate and the raw emotion really gripped me and painted vivid images in my mind, nice work there
Keep it up!
~Speakerskat
P.S. I would love it if you would comment on some of my works!