Young Writers Society

I really enjoyed the poem (: I like the whole story and i like how it was about a soldier fighting for #FF0000 ">a#0000BF ">m#FF0000 ">e#FF0000 ">r#0000BF ">i#FF0000 ">c#0040FF ">a :D Such a great poem
Keep writing


-foreveralone*

I loved it! really understood what he/she was feeling! The way it was written was really good too. well done.

I have to apologize. I didn't realize your hate of Dr.Seuss. It seems to me that the only critique you have is that I should write this how you would write it. The impact also depends on the reader, and I would say that you are looking for work like yours so anything else is elementary. But its cool.... my next one will be a AAAA poem... since you don't like ABAB

Any other poetic form or device in the world. Any. Pick one. I would even give you a shiney new pony if you rhymed ABAB rather than AABB, so you'd have a little more time to get your affairs in order. This whole thing is crammed around Dr Seuss, you contrived every line around the rhyme, and it makes it laboured, and loses all impact. This is especially noticeable when you only vary line length to get there, so you end up with lines like:
"I am the one who fought so that you can wake to your father and your mother. "

My least favourite, (other than the doves that are just kind of thrown in there for another 'love' rhyme-Even Shakespeare thought that was trite by the way, he satirized it in Romeo and Juliet. If Shakespeare calls you a hack, boy, you'd better listen.) is:

"America is the dream for all who welcome peace,

but it seems that to keep our ways, many others must cease. "

'many others must cease' is the most awkward line I have seen in a very long time. This is not my style nor my sentiment but if I was having a thrash at it:

"I am mighty and small in the American Ideal,
which is reasoned to men via napalm and steel."

But then, I just like napalm imagery.

The impact of a poem is lessened if you take your structure from Doctor Seuss. That is not to say the binary rhyming pattern is dead by no means, couplets are still useful, but NOT if you bend the whole line around the rhyme at the end, it should occur naturally. Iambs, that is the coupling of syllables with stresses was originally based on the rhythms in horse riding and in the pulse. It should not go out of its way to rhyme, unless it's a limerick and that's the humour.

"America is the dream for all who welcome peace,

but it seems that to keep our ways, many others must cease. "

"many others must cease" Really? What an awkward phrase, it's just, all the impact is gone, because I'm thinking about green eggs and ham all of a sudden. I'm not a fan of the style or the sentiment, but, let me have a thrash at it..

"America is beyond mortal lives, an ideal,
reasoned to men with napalm and steel."

But then, I do like a good napalm image.

"I fight for the land of dreams,

for the red, white, black, men and women of different genes. "

Wow, it went all that way and didn't even rhyme.

There are other poetic devices in the world. Assonance, alliteration, rhythmic devices, parataxis...there are different forms, villanelles, sonnets, senryu, free verse, explore it, don't be restricted. The rhyming just makes it very very very cumbersome, and artificial. It's not poetic language, neither it is natural dialogue. Set yourself free from the rhyming couplet.

I like the way you have the poem written.

I think that if you made the lines shorter like moved it down a little it would look better.

Thats all I got .

This poem isn't meant to be that dark. I wanted it to to show what a soldier goes through and the reasons that they endure what they do.

I liked the concept of the poem, the whole being a soldier thing. I think if you threw in some more interesting vocabulary to make the whole intensity of being a soldier and the grit of the battlefield a little more realistic, this would be the poem you really wanted it to be. I could tell what you were going for and your almost there, just needs to be spiced up a bit with perhaps some bigger, maybe even darker word choices.