Young Writers Society

I would love to see how this sounds put in more contemporary language gem! You've actually got some pretty interesting images in here - especially that very first line

do the dogs of war chew my ribs

that's an excellent image and really pushes the reader to take up the rest of the poem. I would like a little more of that "war" language incorporated in, because you've got it in that first line and then maybe in that "invisible walls" line but not really other than that.

I interpreted this poem to be maybe about someone who is either nautious from sickness, or perhaps even an eating disorder. That's a pretty dark / emotional topic, but I feel like the emotional weight is cushioned / put at arms' length because of the highly formal language, and I think you should maybe lean into the emotional side of the poem a bit more since it's short and there's not much narrative -> so the emotional side could be the real draw into the poem for readers.

A few other minor suggestions:

Your title is a typo I believe "appitite" should be "appetite".

Sticking with one style of capitalization will make the poem feel more polished. You kind of go back and forth between sentence-case and all lower case here, and have some mid-sentence capital letters too - so I think you should re-visit that!

When you say "Yet I cannot look it in the eyes" -> it's not clear what "it" is? Your soul? your hunger? your food?

It's a little odd that the poem goes from first-person pov being the person struggling with appetite, to third person describing someone else struggling with appetite. You start off using "I'" and then you also call the person struggling as a "starving dear"...

And lastly I think you may not have intended to repeat woe twice in the last two lines as it's a bit redundant.

Overall, this poem definitely has potential and I think is worth taking a second look at! Happy writing~


alliyah

Greetings Lady Gemstone!

So this is my first review back on the site after I forgot my old account of six years, and then also happened to forget about this site soon after making this account, thus I apologise if I seem a bit rough around the edges.

To start, I shall briefly review the vocabulary you employed. The first two and last three lines are fine in this department, so I'll get back to them in a bit. However, in the lines 3-7 we have several questionable (as in, I'm questioning their suitability, not "oh my gosh what is she doing?!")

...the sustenance doth hark.

The first of these is "hark". Hark, as far as I recall, only has two meanings, the one being to hark back (aka reminisce/call back memories), and the other (which I assume is the one you wished to use here) being an exhortation to get someone's attention (basically "Listen up!")
Now, though I could accept that as a decent word choice, and a poetic use of its meaning it becomes confuddled and confusing to a reader if you write it alongside the archaic "doth" (which is an unnecessary verb here). It makes both words feel weak and out of place, especially then also followed by a full-stop rather than a colon/line, etc (the reader, already confused, expects a "call" speech to follow after such a use of hark, yet instead is quite literally stopped dead by a full-stop, breaking the flow)

Come! Abash thy invisible walls, and eat.

"Abash". Unless the food is quite literally trying to embarrass/humiliate you into eating, "Abash" is not the right verb choice in this sentence. By using, for example "Bash down..." you still retain that strong image, but also add to it visually by making the reader picture these walls falling down.

Next we have "thy". Now, I like using Middle English as much as the next poet, but here it, just as "doth" in the previous line, feels out of place. It just comes unexpectedly, but unlike other surprises, this one weakens the imagery you're trying to describe here. (Also, if you still wish to keep the Middle English pronoun, the correct one would be "thine", not "thy", when it precedes a word starting in a vowel)

...the starving dear

Is this "dear" meant to be "deer", or was the spelling intentional (in which case it feels out of place in the rest of the poem) If it is meant to be "deer", then I like using both the imagery of war hounds and then a starving deer.

Now! On to the Grammar/Structure!

Other than the weak punctuation in line 3 that I have already pointed out, there are a few more grammatical/structural points I'd like to share.

nay nor do they bark.

You require a comma between "nay" and "nor". Though I don't really care much about ending punctuation (except where it breaks imagery/confuses), a comma is required here because it is an answer and explanation/elaboration. The nay is an answer to the question in line 1, which the rest of line 2 (nor do they bark.) then elaborates on, so a comma is needing to separate these two parts.

Eat your soul full! Yet I cannot look it in the eye.

In line 5, I'd suggest either moving the second half (yet -> eye ) to a new line, or to add a parenthesis after "full". At the moment it is unclear to the reader that the sustenance's call has ended, and the narrator has started speaking again, so it seems like the sustenance is unable to look something in the eye (especially because of the full stop after "eye" causing a break in the flow) Moving the second half to a new line, or adding parenthesis after full will get rid of any confusion, yet still keep the same intent in the poem.

And as a final preference with grammar/structure, I'd suggest adding a comma or full stop at the end of the second last line, causing the reader to take a break between those last two "woe"s, thus further resonating this image of woe due to a lack of appetite.

My final criteria, Interpretation, is relatively brief. Overall I do get what you are trying to convey to your audience, and as a persons who suffer from body dysmorphia ourself, and thus also eating disorders, we get this struggle between what must and what can be done sometimes.

In conclusion, though there are several grammatical, structural and vocabulary errors that can confuse or lead the reader astray, you have done a good job at still bringing across imagery and symbolism to your audience, allowing them to make an interpretation. I am looking forward to seeing more of your work, and hope my rustiness wears off when I review your next poems