you looked me in the eyes and lied

Hi elysian, here to review your re-vamped poem. I think I may have said on one of your last excerpts but I adore prose poetry and the idea of doing poetry in different ways than expected, so I really love this idea and hope you stick with it.

Now, let's get to comments on this piece.

Meaning

I took this poem to be an emotional exploration of the faults of a relationship after two people have broken up. The narrator feels distressed by the situation and how the two have become strangers, however they realize that they are both different people now and promises to grow without her lost love. There's a note of hope at the end not for the relationship, but that the narrator will have personal growth. I like the glimmer of hope at the end because it adds a different emotional dimension to the story instead of just being all happy or all despairing. The poem was heavily internalized emotionally (the reader is placed right into the heart and mind of the narrator), and I would be interested if you are going to have all the sections be so highly internalized or if there will be some with more outward action - it might be interesting to have some contrast in that.

Form

In a prose poem it's quite difficult to make it seem like a poem. When I read this I definitely can hear some of the poetic cadence and emotional leveling that I would expect from a poem. For instance the beautiful metaphor in this line, "You accessorized me with a glow that could only come from pure, genuine happiness" -- nice! I like that image and it's a unique one too.

I think to take this poem to the next level though, you can look at some elements to improve upon that would make the poem feel more poetic.

Some that I can think of would be increasing the imagery and figurative language used. You already have a lot of figurative language in here actually, but some of it is a bit ordinary like "a part of me is dying" or "heart break" and we're strangers now... all of these themes are good, but I've heard renditions of them in poems before, see if you can take those ordinary metaphors and twist them a bit or draw them out, or just draw out the unique ones that you have already -- this will help your poem feel more new and add more interest.

Second, to make this poem feel more "poetic" I would recommend seeing if you can work in some sound devices like rhyme and assonance and consonance, these go a long way in improving flow too -- to that end, I move to my next point:

Flow
One struggle with prose poetry or poetry with very few line breaks is somehow figuring out how to get some good flow in there so that it still sounds sort of lyrical and dances off the tongue. There are a few ways you can work on this

1) Punctuation
Punctuation is the first way to impact flow. Just as they tell you in elementary school, periods and commas represent places to pause in a piece of writing -- capital letter do the same thing. In some of my prose poetry, I play with different punctuation conventions, mostly by trying to intentionally vary the length of my sentences. This is a good way to build better flow. If all of your sentences are long and drawn out with multiple lists and commas -- then you're going to start have dead drawn-out flow. If all of your sentences. Are. Short and. Choppy. With many, punctuation?? marks... then your flow will also be choppy. I think the best method is to find some in-between where you vary both techniques, having some long sentences and some short ones and trying not to put too many of the same "type" of sentence together.

You've already got a bit of variety in here with the questions that you ask, but I think you could maybe do a bit more with sentence length and style variance to help out the flow and interest of the piece.

2) Phrasing

Most of the time it's pretty difficult to figure out what exactly makes good flow - the best thing to do is honestly always to give a piece a read-out-loud and see what words are sticky or stand out awkwardly. Look for places to increase word-economy and be as concise as possible (that doesn't mean to make the poem as short as possible, but just to make sure every word counts! When you eliminate "thats" and "becauses" sometimes that helps out the poem. Personally I like keeping in the word "and" even if it seems unnecessary because it shows narrative progression.

Here's one instance where the flow can be improved by eliminating unnecessary words:
"Every part of me wanted to believe that every time you said you’d never leave me and that I was the only one you were telling the truth. " - as is, this sentence without any extra commas or line breaks is a bit clunky and difficult even to discern what is being said. Work on the word-economy. Are there any words that could be eliminated? How do you craft this in a way that only the important words are left?

Here's how I'd edit it:
"Every part of me wanted to believe that you were telling the truth, every time you said you’d never leave me. and that I was the only one."
or "I waned to believe you'd never leave. That you were true. And I was the only one."

Of course you can find your own way to phrase it, but I'd seriously sit down with every sentence and figure out what are the necessary words, and what sentences don't actually make sense on their own. This will condense your writing and improve the flow.

3) Repetition (of sounds and words)

The last way I've found that flow can generally be improved is through using tools like rhyme, assonance, and consonance. There's no need to follow a particular scheme or add rhyme into every line, but using a little bit of it subtly here and there honestly does wonders in improving the cadence and flow of a piece.

Here's a couple articles that can lend a few tips on that: Secret Treasures in Poetic Devices
Rhyme...all the time!

Nitpicks
The spelling and grammar in this piece were generally excellent, I don't have a lot to say on this - but thanks for taking the time to really edit your piece so that as a reader I can take it more seriously and it just seems more polished. Well done on this.

The only thing I really caught was in the first stand-alone paragraph you've left one of the "i"s un-capitalized.

And then this line was confusing as far as what the time-line of it was: "Ask anyone that knows me, they could tell I was happier than I had been in years. " -- is the narrator saying they were happier when they were in a relationship or now that they've broken up?

Narrative
Being that this is prose poetry for a book, I would assume that the narrative aspect would be some of the strongest. And for the most part I think your characterization and conflict are really good (especially as far as the narrator goes) however I think you could have a bit of improvement on the elements of the plot progression.

For instance, between these two stanzas: "You said that you’ll always stand by me and that we’d make it.

Many had left before you, so why did my heart break when you did the same? "

something has clearly happened to end the relationship, but as a reader we just get this dramatic jump and don't get any of these important details. While in some areas of the plot it's perfectly okay to be broad and vague, I would say conflict and characterization especially as far as what ended these two's relationship are important aspects to be specific on.

I've written an article on Specificity in Poetry that you might find helpful: Specificity in Poetry

You've done really well establishing specificity in the emotional revelations of the narrator, now just a bit more into the actual plot and conflict would add one more layer.

Overall
Sorry if any of this seemed harsh! I really did enjoy this piece and love the concept you've got. My review is mainly focussing on a couple areas here and there where I think you could have improvement, but there were plenty of things I thought you did really well in as well. For instance, you've got a great handle on creating emotional depth to a piece. I cannot tell you how boring it is to read poem after poem of "I'm sad, I'm heartbroken" etc. with just one emotional level, but you've really dug into what the narrator in this piece is feeling and do a great job presenting the depth of their emotional turmoil and revelations in this.

I look forward to reading more of this piece as it comes out!

Please let me know if you have any questions about my review.

best,

alliyah

Okay, so I completely revamped this work. It was so poorly written and I just wasn't happy with it. So, it's almost like a completely new poem but it's based off of the old one. Please leave a review! I'm planning on turning this series into a book and I'm super serious about making sure it's the best I can put out into the world. I will post the old one here, may it rest in peace haha.

"My Baby Faced Boy"

I want to believe you. I want to think that every time you said you’d never leave me and that I was the only one you were telling the truth. I want to believe you when you promise me that you love me.

I want to ignore all the people telling me that we’ll never make it. I want to just pretend I don’t hear that you’re texting your ex and that you like another girl. I wanna block out everyone telling me you’re a player and that you’ll just break my heart.

Because from what I’ve experienced with you, you’re truthful. You never want to leave me and I’m the only one and you love me. You have said that you’ll always stand by me and that we’d make it. You’ve promised me that you’re not texting your ex and that you don’t like another girl. You’ve said that you’re not a player and you will never break my heart.

So why is my heart breaking? Why do I feel more and more distance between us, more and more lies? Why do I feel like you’re not genuine when you say you love me? Why do I feel like you are texting your ex and that you do like that other girl. Why are you avoiding my eyes in the hallways, why are you ignoring my words?

All the things we had already planned, all the things that we had said, they’re all saved in my phone. I read them on a daily basis, trying to figure out what I did wrong. Was I too clingy? Am I too annoying? Too jealous? What exactly did I do to make you avoid my stare and ignore my whispers?

All I did was love you unconditionally. It’s all I ever do. I hate feeling like I annoy the people I love, so I’ve started to stop messaging you. I’ve started to avoid your stares and ignore your whispers. I try to pretend like I don’t notice you glancing in my direction, or how you laugh with your friends. I pretend it doesn’t bother me that we don’t talk anymore or walk to classes together.

I act like everything is perfectly fine, that I’m perfectly okay with this all. But inside a part of me is dying. How, in this little amount of time, have I become so attached to you? How can I be so hurt by all of this in the small time we’ve been together?

It’s because as we get older, we realize it’s not how much time you’ve spent together, it’s the quality of the time spent together. And when we were together I was always smiling. Ask anyone that knows me, they could tell I was happier than I had been in years. You always treated me right and you always made me happy.

So I’m sorry If I’m too clingy, too jealous, or too annoying. I’m sorry about how much I’ve messed up. But I will fight everyday for you. I will not give up. I know I have a very long future with you. Just please, don’t be so quick to give up on me.

I will always fight for my baby faced boy. For my baby, my love, my sweets, my cutie, my piece of perfection…
forever.

{excerpt from a novel I'll never write #4 }

Hello, Blackie here to review you <3

Hmm... This is a rather tricky piece is it not? This sounds to me like a letter you'd write to TBFB (The Baby Faced Boy). Overall, you did a good job of conveying a train of thought, I really liked how you successfully used present tense without any slips, which is difficult. However, I've spotted a few oopsie-daisies here and there.

1) You're repetitive; and repetition is BAD.
"I want to just pretend I don’t hear that you’re texting your ex and that you like another girl"
"You’ve promised me that you’re not texting your ex and that you don’t like another girl"
" Why do I feel like you are texting your ex and that you do like that other girl."

I found this REALLY annoying. You could have deleted the first sentence and used the other two. While this really makes an excellent job of conveying just how much you worry about his ex and another girl, it's really terrifying to read.

2)Don't start a paragraph with because, so, or any other conjunction, for while it is grammatically okay, it's not good for your story's flow. I mean;

"Because from what I’ve experienced with you, you’re truthful."

Because from isn't even grammatically correct in this case. You could have said "because, from..." OR just rewrite this sentence completely.

"So I’m sorry If I’m too clingy, too jealous, or too annoying. " This has two errors unrelated to eachother.

a) comma missing
b) wrong tense. He already broke up with you.


3) YOU USE TOO MANY RHETORICAL QUESTIONS.
In a good piece of writing, rhetorical questions are asked only 2-3 times at the most important parts to capture attention completely. I realize that this is a train of thought, but it still doesn't work properly.

You could introduce all the questions in the beginning, or just choose the most important ones and delete the rest. Moving on.

"I will always fight for my baby faced boy. For my baby, my love, my sweets, my cutie, my piece of perfection…"

TOO MANY ADJECTIVES. 3 IS MAXIMUM.

Right... Pheeeew. Alright.
In conclusion, I'd like to say that your work has a lot of potential with these minor fixes, and I'll be checking on you to see how you improve. Good work <3

Love.
Blackie,

Hello, priceofwords here

I know you're not gonna write it, but I do wish you'd write the rest of the novel out. I really want to read more about this heartbroken girl and the boy who just left her without giving her a chance. Considering this was a personal story as well, you did great with this, as sometimes it can be harder writing about something that has happened in your own life.

I particularly loved the repetition of the ex - couple ignoring each other's stares and whispers. It made the story particularly endearing. There are also no spelling, grammatical or punctuation errors in this piece, so well done for that too.

If I could suggest how you could make it even better, you could try using more advanced language. It would make the piece sound more authentic, and readers would become attached to the story in a different way entirely, for it would sound rather poetic. This is just an idea, don't feel you should do this if you don't want to.

Apart from that, this was a great piece, and I look forward to viewing more of your work!

priceofwords