Blue, Purple and Red

Hmmmmm.......

-thinks for a long time about this 'un-



Well...

Let me be honest..

As poetry, I don't like it.

Thats not very elaborate is it? But at least I got it off my chest... It could work as a song yes.....if accompannied with that really annoying beaty music....but as a poem...it's all overflowing and unbalanced.... Okay, so I fail at poetry myself, so i feel like a hypocrite saying this, but let me give at leasta few hints here...

And I tell you that I'll remember

All the times we spent together.

The rhyming pattern is broken up here...yeah, I know that all poems don't need to be entirely consistent, but you have no reason to break the pattern up here..

It would work better if you developed a pattern, like a simple mathematics one, to use in your poems...

i.e
With numbers that are the same being a verse ending in ryhming words....Hope you understand that...
1
1
2
2
3
3

0
4
4
0




Also, you should really try to be a bit more expansive with your description..


Listing colours does nothing for me, even if I imagine a sexy ladies voice saying it....

Try further describing them.

There are hundreds of types of red! Just ues your imagination..


i.e
vivid red
blaring red
lucid red
blood red..


You can even be vague, letting the persons mind fill it in....like

-pure red-


No two people will have the same impression of pure red, while they may have the same image for 'blood red'
We all know what blood looks like, but 'pure' lets us do a little thinking.




Hope that helps..

Conclusion?


I am not impressed.
Not yet.

Here as requested, Teddy!

Teddybear22 wrote:Blue, Purple and Red

I agree with Kitty about this. There's nothing interesting or original about it, nothing dragging the reader in. Find a spark. A poem may be born as a snippet of verse, maybe just a line or two that seems to come out of nowhere. That's what's usually called inspiration, and once you have that beginning you simply need to flesh it out, to build the rest of the poem around it.

But all you see is the cold-blue mist.

There is no need for the hyphon in between cold and blue. Since they're two unconnected ideas, it would flow a lot better without the hyphon.

You help me up and we start anew,
I look up and notice that the distance has grew.

For this to be grammatically correct, 'grew' should be 'grown'. It doesn't fit the rhyming scheme, but I'll get to that later in the overall comments.

I know that we wont make it.

'Won't' should have an apostrophe in it to make it grammatically correct, and this shouldn't have a fullstop at the end as it is coupled with the next line, is it not?

I sever our connection, completely breaking it,

This reads awkwardly because the previous line ended with 'it'. I suggest you replace it.

And then I see
Blue, Purple and Red infront of me.

There should be a space in between 'in' and 'front'. Furthermore, you need to rethink your rhythm here, as it's obviously gone askew compared with the rest of the poem.

Advice Overall

You have some good ideas here, but to be honest, it's not quite working for me. I'm all for the abstract effect, but this is too vague, there's nothing for the reader to visualise, to hold onto.

Use concrete imagery and vivid descriptions.

Love, hate, happiness: these are all abstract concepts. Many, maybe all, poems are, deep down, about emotions and other abstractions, but it's hard to build a strong poem using only abstractions - it's just not interesting. The key, then, is to replace or enhance abstractions with concrete images, things that you can appreciate with your senses: a rose, a shark, or a crackling fire, for example. The concept of the objective correlative may be useful. An objective correlative is an object, several objects, or a series of events (all concrete things) that evoke the emotion or idea of the poem.

Really powerful poetry not only uses concrete images; it also describes them vividly. Show your readers and listeners what you're talking about--help them to experience the imagery of the poem. Put in some "sensory" handles. These are words that describe the things that you hear, see, taste, touch, and smell, so that the reader can identify with their own experience. Give some examples rather than purely mental/intellectual descriptions. For example: "He made a loud sound" versus "He made a loud sound like a hippo eating 100 stale pecan pies with metal teeth".

Beauty? Meaning? You must be talking about poetic devices.

The most well known poetic device is rhyme. Rhyme can add suspense to your lines, enhance your meaning, or make the poem more cohesive. It can also make it prettier. Don't overuse rhyme. It's a crime. In fact you don't have to use rhyme at all. Poetic devices can make a poem or, if they bring too much attention to themselves, they can ruin it. Your rhyming seems forced because sometimes you've made mistakes like 'grew' instead of 'grown', simply to get a rhyme in. Sometimes, rhyme works for a poem, but here, I think you're better using freeverse.

Decide what poetry style suits your subject. There are a great many different poetic styles. [1]. If you see "Winter icicles / plummeting like Enron stock..." perhaps you've got a haiku in your head. As a poet, you have a wide variety of set forms to choose from: limericks, sonnets, villanelles ... the list goes on and on. You may also choose to abandon form altogether and write your poem in free verse. While the choice may not always be as obvious as the example above, the best form for the poem will usually manifest itself during your writing.

Words

Choose the right words. It's been said that if a novel is "words in the best order," then a poem is "the best words in the best order." Think of the words you use as building blocks of different sizes and shapes. Some words will fit together perfectly, and some won't. You want to keep working at your poem until you have built a strong structure of words. Use only those words that are necessary, those that enhance the meaning of the poem. Choose your words carefully. The differences between similar sounding words or synonyms can lead to interesting word play.

Child Labour

Edit your poem. When the basic poem is written, set it aside for awhile and then read the poem out loud to yourself. Go through it and balance the choice of words with the rhythm. Take out unnecessary words and replace imagery that isn't working. Some people edit a poem all at once, while others come back to it again and again over time. Don't be afraid to rewrite if some part of the poem is not working. Sometimes you just can't fix something that essentially doesn't work. I noticed there were some little mistakes in the poem that slowed down my overall review because I had to point them out.

And...Snap!

Save your most powerful message or insight for the end of your poem. The last line is to a poem what a punch line is to a joke--something that evokes an emotional response. Give the reader something to think about, something to dwell on after reading your poem. Resist the urge to explain it; let the reader become engaged with the poem in developing an understanding of your experience or message.

Hope this helps!
Good luck!

-Sarah

Blue, Purple and Red

[Ask yourself what's interesting about this first line? Does it catch the reader's attention, spark an image or an idea, make them think? No. It's just four words, it's just a few colours. With poetry it helps to think outside the usual restrictions and ask yourself what will cause the biggest impact. Use a metaphor or a simile, use a vague, fragmented sentence. Anything really but make it as captivating as possible.]

And that sort of applies to the rest of your poem. There's an idea behind it, a story you want to tell but it's lost behind forced rhymes and simple syntax. Or rather, it's there, plain in front of the reader's eyes but there's nothing more to it, no deeper meaning or open ending.

Rhyming poetry isn't bad. I want to make that clear because there are two misconceptions I come across regularly. The first is that poetry should rhyme and it isn't a poem if there's no rhyme and the other is that rhyme is bad and shouldn't be used because it slaughters the meaning. Then there's many views in between. Rhyming and rhythm can be really effective when used properly but the aim of your poem shouldn't primarily be to rhyme, it should be to entertain the reader or to make them think.

You need to take the initial ideas behind this poem and ask yourself if you want to entertain the reader (thrill them, scare them, cheer them) or if you want to make them think, on a deep and perplexing social issue, for example. I'd suggest the first. Then decide what images or action you want to convey and how you can do this in an interesting way. A line of poetry could read:

'Insects squirmed on her legs'

which does the job, it tells the story but the idea behind poetry is to be more than a narration. So instead it could read:

'Stunted beasts devoured her flesh'

and it says the same thing, near enough but is much more interesting to read.

I'm not the best at explaining this but I'd suggest you give it another go and think more about the words themselves than trying to make them rhyme. Than can come later. When you can write the context of a poem well, that's when you can try and twist your words to fit various formats and add to your impact. But never sacrifice meaning for rhyme.

Hope this helps a little,

Heather xx