It must always be so

Hey Lette!

Here as requested. I’m pretty tired so I hope I’m going to make sense here. Now, I know this is a response to the poem in workshop, and I’m glad you want to work further on this, you have a good base here, for sure. More particularly, I adore your first line “The space between us, between your hands/and mine”, this is lovely. I love this. I would though suggest you lose the second “between” it’s not needed to convey meaning here, we already understand the between. Again, “The distance..” is wonderful.

With those two lines giving major promise, I hope you forgive me when I say that the rest of this could use some work. The initial line (and later one) suggest a simple but heartfelt narrative, an explanation almost, which the rest of your poem lacks. The poem on the whole has a very melodramatic feel which could be better utilised in a more demure fashion. If you were to pull back some of the descriptions and give us something a little more tangible, it would be beautiful. What I mean to say is that “The space between us, your hands and mine” could easily be followed by something like “three steps from the front door you stop, and kiss my temple.” Or something that is both informative and beautiful to witness. We’re looking for something a little more specific to situation. Saying blue eyes, pain, sadness is all descriptive but not emotive, despite how it looks. Instead it creates a kind of distance because it doesn’t give us any context to delve into. I don’t mean personal context but poetical context – what is this narrator and why? What is she saying? That pain is terrible but we must do it anyway for what we love. Why? Because she is heartbroken, and this is devastation at its most horrid face, avid hope. We want to know these things through the text rather than being told and I know you can do that.

Fashion a little more linear narrative for your characters – the narrator and her lover –and then shape the poem around the context. Give it some colour and life, and then you’ll have something that touches as well as speaks.

If you have any questions, please ask. You know where to find me.

-El Penguino

Hey Scar!

I know how little time you took for this and well, great work! I can't crit poetry, but I'll tell you what I think:

the dullness in those eyes; so clear and bright,
the dullness in those eyes; so clear and bright,

But now, with you gone...just,

It must always be so, my devil in disguise.