Gabe's Last Race

Hey KeepWriting,

Here to review.

Overall, I thought this was cute. The use of rhyme and the limerick qualities to the poem really stood out.

That being said, when horses race, they stretch. It's a bit different than picking their heads up because if they pick their head up, that looks more like this: 1, 2, 3 which a horse will actually do when they're grabbing the bit to really run away and ignore the rider. That's "held up high" for a horse. Racing horses are holding their heads where they naturally sit when you look at the anatomy of a horses shoulders and withers, so basically what you're saying is that he's racing with his nose up in the air, which he's not. He wouldn't be a racing horse if that was what he was doing, he wouldn't be running fast enough. What your horse should be doing is holding his head in the most opportune place for free movement of his shoulders and communication with his rider. These race horses aren't just, GO GO GO, they're listening to their jockey the entire time they're on the track.

I really feel like your second couplet is rejecting the idea of a jockey being with the horse instead of the bond that horses have with their riders. That's probably just because you're chasing after the rhyme, which is a shame because I really don't like the rhyme in this poem. I feel like the rhymes you picked were rather obvious and didn't yield themselves well to the lines you were forced to use because of them. The awkward diction in half of this poem is due to the rhymes. As an example, horses don't sprint to find a mate, usually they're brought one because frankly, horses are an industry, especially track horses. In the wild, they would mate with whomever is already in their heard, so again, no need to run all over the place to find a mate. The only thing they'd run for is away from a predator, or to go get food. Some of the younger horses might run around challenging one another too, that's where you'd see head throwing [high heads] but race horses, nah. They just aren't quarter horses. Quarter horses walk around with their head pretty level to their withers because of how they're bred and built. Stock horses are built for a Western Pleasure style of riding, which favors the lower head where you see a horse with it's head "down" and even that has exceptions like with the Arabian Western Pleasure ring Here which is just "collected" not "head held high." Here's a western pleasure that's probably a stock horse for you to compare the differences. So that being said, let's get back on the topic of poor rhymes.

"As he raced around the track" is really unmotivating. It has very predictable and bland words we hear every day. I feel like you have two opposite problems, using language that's too bland, and using language really awkwardly. "Behind him dust did fly" is an example of the opposite problem. This isn't something someone would say, while "As he raced around the track" is something everyone would say, but it's said so much, it's really more just a news bullet than a poem. "As Sanders raced around the track he lost his shoe." So I really feel like these rhymes are setting you up to lose interest in the crafting of this poem. They might make it sound sort of like a limerick, but you've got to really ask yourself if that's the best feel for this poem.

Consider this, your competition is steep when it comes to writing about this subject in this style. I looked it up. Here are just a couple of the poems I could find about horse racing, and most of them are rhymed. These are other writers who post their work online.

http://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/racing_reverie_686869
http://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/running_horses_741114
http://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/horse_at_the_gate_770009
http://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/american_pharoah_686341
http://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/secretariat_678943
http://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/horse_racing_678900

They're all not only shorter than yours, but several of them are more witty as they tie into reality and history that's happened and even relate them to new things, like Secretariat distracting people from Watergate.

With how long horse racing has been around, and how popular it has been in the past, it is hard to say that you'll ever write something that hasn't been written before, however, if you take that idea you started with, this is a horses last race, and you draw on that, and you explore something other than rhymed lines, then you might be able to really talk about it in a way that makes a beautiful picture. Right now, the imagery you present isn't really vivid enough to call this a solid foundation for a poem.

The images you present are:
Silky coat reflected the sun
A jockey on his back
sprinting
held his head up high
maintained a long gait,
dust flew behind him
people shouting

Are any of those really that descriptive? What color was he? What were his colors for the race? Was he sweaty? Was he tall? short? brawny? More than that, really give us something to feel in the poem. We want an imagery display that helps us really connect with what we're reading. This is a poem about a race, his last race, so help us feel the anxiety, the joy, the love, something! The emotional content of your poem right now sits in one line.

He always loved to run.

Well, that's not even telling us if he loves to run now, that's just telling us that he used to love to run. What is that supposed to do for us? We have an audible shouting, but that's so fleeting that it doesn't even measure up to the roaring in some of your competition poems which are mostly shorter than yours.

I think the last thing I have to say is more critique about horses. Sprinting is not really what they do, they have gaits, so use them. Horse lovers will appreciate it because a lot of people know what a gallop is. You can use an extended gallop instead of "long gait" because we all know that's really what you're talking about. It's just the rhyme that's holding you back, again.

Aside from that, I am really unsure what to say about your diction because it's all over the place. I feel like you're struggling to get the rhymes and that's very distracting from this being a poem for the fun of a last race. Also, knowing what happens to race horses after they're done with their career, I really couldn't find much joy in this poem, especially without the emotionally packed language that would have carried this one along if you hadn't been doing the rhyme.

There's a way to do rhyme well, but this isn't humorous enough to be that. All it is, is cute.

What I think makes it cute is that it's simplistic. It doesn't really get involved in a lot of the stuff going on in this poem. The detached nature of this poem gives it a language that makes it feel sort of like it was written by an old man who was watching his favorite horse race for the last time through these binoculars, but without the financial devastation of what that actually implies. An aloof man for sure.

That being said, I think if you really wanted to get into "Gabe's" head [Most horses now a days are named some witty phrase like The Sun's Calling so this name throws me off for a race horse] then you could do that by rewriting this poem and just letting loose for a while. Focus on what you want to say and what imaginative thing you want to do with the perspective of a horse rather than this trite rhyming that you seem to be stuck with.

I had a guy I mentored once who was constantly rhyming, and I challenged him to do an unrhymed poem. It turned out really well because he just wrote the poem about how he hated writing poems that didn't rhyme, it just didn't work in his head. It was just how he spoke so when he wrote a poem, that's how it came out. After that, I told him to just bury his rhymes and he really took off from there. If you're finding this sort of trivial block as well, you might want to write in paragraph, prose style, and just use emotionally filled language like a prose writer would. Use your poetic devices, oh, okay, you don't have those in this.

"As if to find a mate" is about as close as you get to a simile, keep things like that, but do things that are less related, and more tangibly accessible to your audience. Here's a link to a helpful place for poetic devices, a place for vivid language, and some other helpful links you might like.

Kiss My Assonance - 5 ways to improve your poetry
Breathing emotion into scenes
Make Your Readers Feel
Poetry Tutorials Article Index

Okay, that being said, here's a summary.

I think this is cute because of the style you're using, but I don't think cute is what you're doing this for. I really feel like you need to break it up a bit and develop your idea with poetic devices like metaphor, alliteration, simile, and more than just rhyme. I feel like the rhymes are really holding you back because you haven't had the chance to read enough to know what's already commonplace among your topic, which really puts you at a disadvantage. If you opened yourself up to more than just a capitalized all the way through, end punctuated, rhymed, structure that's not even really a structure like structured poetry goes, I mean, even if you did an actual structure like a Terza Rima a Pantoum, or something that was actually giving you guidance, rather than creating the structure yourself in this half-limerick style you'd end up with a better result.

My suggestion is for you to rewrite this poem. It's NaPo, so that'll be one less that you have to do for a day, and really get into the nitty gritty feeling of a challenge as you talk about Gabe and his trial at the last race. Really get into the psychology of it if you can, and challenge yourself to do a poem that doesn't rhyme, and doesn't flow like a limerick. Stretch your neck out and search for the oats on the other side of the finish line KeepWriting.

We're waiting for you over here.

-Aley

Hello, InfiniteRectangles here!

This is a very sweet poem, but, as Rydia mentioned, the title is a bit unfitting. Titles need to be interesting to capture the attention of your readers, and yours, while it sparked mild curiosity, wasn't that intriguing. It's not something you necessarily need to change, but it is something to keep in mind.

The last two lines didn't really sound right to me. "And maintained his long gate" doesn't seem to fit the flow of the rest of the poem, but that could just be how I read it. Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but shouldn't "gate" be "gait"? Also, the last line of the poem seems a bit forced. It seems like you only wrote it so that you would have a rhyme. I would suggest finding a more natural way to make your lines rhyme, or scrap the rhyme scheme altogether.

The last thing I will mention is that this poem is a bit too short for its own good. I understand it wasn't meant to be some long, narrative type thing, but a little more description would be nice. As it is, the poem has a sense of in-completion.

That's all I have for you. This was a sweet poem and I enjoyed reading it, and I'm looking forward to reading more of your work. Keep writing and have a wonderful day/night!

Hullo!

Specifics

1. I'm guessing Gabe is the name of the horse? It's a slightly uninteresting title so it might be better if you called it 'Gabe Reigns' or 'Gabe's Last Run'. Something which tells us Gabe is a name and gives it a bit more context.

2. I think the transition between the first statement and the second is a little rough/ jarring. Perhaps try to link those two parts together, something like:

His silky coat reflected the sun
As he raced around the track. [Change the full stop to a semi colon or comma.]
He How he always loved to run
Even with a jockey on his back.

3. I think the rest of the poem flows well but the last line perhaps feels a little forced because it's the only line where you've switched the syntax around and it feels like you've done it so that the poem rhymes. An easy fix would be something like 'While behind him dust flew high'.

Overall

It's a sweet poem! It would be nice if it was a little longer and gave some more details on the horse's accomplishments or the relationship between him and the speaker. What did he like to eat? Was he good with strangers?

All the best with this!

~Heather

Hello, Tigerlilly here to review!

This poem is very short and simple, so forgive me for finding lack of things to fix. I really like the way it flows, and the way the rhyme doesn't feel forced. The punctuation is on point, and the capitalization fits the poem well. One thing I personally would change is the length. I see the horse, there's great imagery, but I don't really see a story. I know this isn't necessary, but I see a possible story line to the poem. You can tell he's a racehorse, so is he racing? Does he win? I think it would be better so that I don't just see the horse- I feel him. Does that make sense? I hope it does.

Nonetheless, this poem was pretty good. I enjoyed the rhyme and imagery used. Keep writing, and have a nice day!