Tonight the lights are dimmed;
The halls fall on deaf ears.
Each doorway an entrance
To the unknown—to the human.
Somewhere a mothers tears
Fall for her child.
Someplace a man speaks
With his last dying breath.
A bed emptied;
A bed filled.
But here there is silence.
Somewhere a child is quietly born,
While a group of nurses
Sift through death certificates
With deafening laughter.
There will be no noise tonight,
Just the sweet nothings of your harmonic breath.
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140,596 Literary Works • 673,545 Reviews
Hmm...Via, it's good, but it didn't really peak my interest. I think it can be done better. Keep up the good work.
-Rick
Hey Yoda! Thanks for letting me practise on your poems. It's a huge help. ^_^
Random question -- how do halls fall on deaf ears? *confused*
Hm. An interesting little poem. I like it... but I'm also befuddled by it? Lol, shows you what I know about poetry. xD
Erm, I'm trying to put my finger on exactly what bugs me about it. I suppose the fact that it seems like none of the ideas relate, but I think that's just me? Meh. I'm terrible with poetry. I'm trying, though! xD
I suppose it's kind of a good thing I don't really have anything to say. Aren't poems supposed to make you think? Heh. Good job, you made me think. xD
-Saint Razorblade
The Official YWS Pirate
I have to agree with smorgishborg. The poem was very confusing. It wasn't focused at all. However, the sound was nice. Also, I didn't understand the meaning of the poem.
Yes, I am alive and kicking! And I promise I'll post in GC soon. =) But for now, onto your lovely poem, yes? ^^
A truly fascinating image there, the halls falling... it brings to mind the sound of footsteps echoing down a long corridor.
I love this, but I'd make it into a proper sentence--you could do this by either connecting it with the previous line (changing the period in 1.2 to a comma and inserting 'where' in the beginning of 1.3; or, simply by inserting 'is' between 'doorway' and 'an').
The missing apostrophe has already been commented on; frankly, though, I think these are the weakest lines in the poem. I'd delete them and make the suggested changes to the following lines--
Maybe instead, "A bed is emptied; / A bed is filled."
I'm not sure I like that image so much; the 'deafening laughter' part in particular is just far too strong for the subtle, cyclical theme of the poem thus far. Maybe you could make it a bit more subtle?
This I adore. You've come full circle in terms of quality: towards the middle there it got a little shaky, but in the beginning and end this poem was perfection. Brava!
Wow, great poem! I loved the part about harmonic breath!
These last two lines bother me. In and of themselves, they're very good. I wish I had thought of them. ^_^
But, in context, it makes me feel as if the poem ended too soon, or did not lead up to these lines enough.
There's almost a "stop and go" feeling to the poem, which I like. The contrast between events, such as death and birth and loud and quite, pulled me in. Because these concepts are indeed opposites, the breaks in your poem really tie in well.
You do words justice, Via.
I really did like it.
Very nice use of aural imagery in here. I can not only see everything happening but hear it too. Very effective. I also liked your assonance in the second line, I'd suggest more of this if you could; it works really well with the sounds theme you've got here.
Some things I thought were a touch overdone. For example I'm not sure about all of the adverbs an adjectives, some seem a bit to overdo it. I'd question if you really need all of them.
"Dying" for example in that line doesnt seem to strengthen the poem. Would "last breath" be more powerful? I'm not sure.
That's a bit full. I like it on one line, so I think the thing to do would be to shorten it and take out one of the adjectives at least. To me it just seemed overloaded.
Over all, I really enjoyed it. Just a few things that I needed to clear up.
<3,
Monki
Interesting poem. I can relate to it because I really hate hospitals…not like that means much in this critique @__@
The halls fall on deaf ears this line confused me but somehow that works. I think the assonance ‘halls fall’ is really appropriate – though maybe unintentional.
I don’t know about you, but I really appreciate constructive criticism. So I’ll try and make this complimenting rant as useful as I can. The description in the first stanza – I had to reread it through to make sure that it flowed well. I wasn’t sure at first, but on reading it through again, I found that I liked the ironic humour that rings from the ‘A bed emptied; A bed filled’. I like how you’ve made this as impersonal as possible to emphasise the extremely inadequate feeling that you get in a hospital (well I do). Though, I’m not sure that using the word ‘fall’ a second time in ‘mothers tears fall for her child’. This is impersonal, though I’m not sure if it works well. Surely, the intention of this line is to show the emotions that are expressed by the mother – not that tears are falling from the mother just because she has sore eyes.
In the second stanza: Has a child ever been ‘quietly’ born? Is this a scientology hospital XD? I’m not sure ‘quietly’ is the word that does the contrast justice…I know that it’s a paradox with the ‘deafening laughter’ – it just stood out…ah well *shrug*. I LOVE the imagery in the second stanza, it’s really powerful. With deafening laughter – something about this line…I’m not sure what it is about it but I’m not sure if it goes. Maybe it shouldn’t be ‘with’…that word doesn’t seem to run smooth. Though, looking at alternatives, they don’t work either. Maybe it does work and I’m just being picky – that’s more likely XP.
The third stanza…ahhh, it gave me that old tingle down my spine. I take it that it is meant to show that when you’re in hospital, for whatever reason, you aren’t conscious of what is around you…only on what you are there for. It’s only when you aren’t there, that the strange indifference towards death is apparent…very nice XD.
A nice poem to think on…enjoyable and powerful.
This seemed very isolated from what's around it. Sounds more removed from what everything else is saying. Whereas the rest of the poem seems to deal with a setting internal to a place (hospital, yes?), this speaks more generally, like you're suddenly thrown outside of this world that's been created for you in the rest of the poem.
I love, love the tone. It's at once in whispers and like a painting painted in warm, golden colours. I like the sound of "deafening" against "death" in the second stanza, third and fourth lines. A cool reversal. However, "deaf ears" was used in the second line of the first stanza, so do you really want to repeat phrases?
I thought it ended a little too quickly. No scratch that. Oh, I don't know. Maybe it's the break transition from the deafening laughter to the no noise tonight (from extreme noise to silence is, in itself, deafening)? Something to look at, anyway.
Woah Via, this is some powerful stuff. Claudette and smorgishbord have covered pretty much everything. I love the internal rhyme of "hall" and "fall". I love "a bed empty,
a bed filled",
and "sift through death certificates."
It really conveyed a sense of insignifigance, which contrasted with "tears"and the other expressions of pain.
I really love the contrast here, birth quiet, laughter loud.
It didn't work for me, I'm afraid.
It's a step or two away from being quite good, however...
What bothered me the most were quite word choices, which really disrupted flow and meaning.
... and it makes the poem more confusing then I already found it. It's pleasant, and the sound is nice, but it's too convoluted, too unfocused, too full of itself.
I dunno, for me it didn't read well. If you want, tell me what I missed. I don't like to misunderstand poems...
Tonight the lights are dimmed;
The halls fall on deaf ears. [This makes figurative sense, I think, but it's kind of weird. Perhaps I'm too literal]
Each doorway an entrance
To the unknown—to the human. [I love the connection between unknown and human here, it's chilling]
Somewhere a mothers tears [did you mean not to put an apostrophe?]
Fall for her child.
Someplace a man speaks
With his last dying breath.
A bed emptied;
A bed filled. [this is so... chilling. So little words to say so much, and in the same way quiet]
But here there is silence.
Somewhere a child is quietly born, [quietly bothers me but I do not know what else would fit]
While a group of nurses
Sift through death certificates [this makes me think of "The office of Dead Letters" in Bartleby the scrivener]
With deafening laughter. [You used "dead" above so I think the reuse doesn't work, and I don't like the word there anyway. It just doesn't... work]
There will be no noise tonight,
Just the sound of your breathing.
It's a superb poem, so silent and crisp. I half want to suggest all lower case, to pull the silence in even more. You're such a wonderful poet, Via, it is amazing. The silence was so easy to hear in the line breaks, and the stanza breaks. It was perfect. Chilling, scary, realistic, and silent. Bravo.
And, sorry for my incredebly lazy style of critique. ^_^