Young Writers Society

Hey Ashwin! Haraya here with a review.

The way I understood this poem is it's about a lack of consciousness of the priviledge a student has. There were implications of a divide between the speaker and the people in his surroundings through out your poem.

In the first stanza, there was a hint of a divide from the way you described the raindrops. You also described your vehicle as having a God-like ability to create crocodiles from mud. This shows the speaker having some superiority.

In the third and fourth stanzas, it is shown that the other people do not share this superiority with others. The speaker observes a child happily playing in the mud. They also notice workers in a quarry, who needed to exert their energy and effort to live--to make themselves a man.

As the speaker passes by these scenes, the speaker realizes their advantage and feels guilty of not being guilty, hence thinking themselves as a villain.

In my opinion this message is successfully conveyed to readers.

What I want to critique on particularly is word choice and the flow of the poem.

At first, the fourth stanza threw me off. It was very sudden since the speaker had just passed by a boy playing in the mud. I think it's also unexpected for someone to find a quarry on their way to school. It made me wonder about the setting. Was this supposed to be medieval (because you used the image of a knight)? In that case, I think the quarry would be more believable, but it still feels a bit out of place. I suggest look for a better setting that feels organic with the rest of the poem.

I think the sudden images of mangling spiders and hell in the last stanza weren't appropriate. It disrupted the mood of the poem. I think you placed it there to describe the guilt you experienced but I think it wasn't successful. It is impossible, if not difficult for a reader to understand what it feels to be mangled by spiders in hell. I suggest use a different image that will be more vivid to a reader.

That's all I wanted to say! By the way, welcome to YWS! Hope you enjoy it here! Hope my review helps you out!

Hi! I'm Lee, and here to review your poem!

It was amazing, really well-written and thought provoking. However, there are a few things I'd like to point out before I begin complimenting individual lines and aspects.

It was spattering when I left for school,
As rain drops deigned to meet brackish puddles,
And as the stencils on my man-made ride,
Traced crocodiles from mud like God or Man.

And should have dropped

Infested with workers

Dragging crushed granite, not unlike their dreams,

That stung like spiders

And then I saw why

Mirthful and without a care for himself.

O! To think how brutish some men can be.

Hey Ashwin! Welcome to YWS! I'm Myth and I'd like to drop by and give you a review.

I felt that through this, you're trying to express how you just watch things happen around you every day, but cannot do anything about them or sometimes you're unable to appreciate things the way you should.

I'd like to start by saying that pain cannot be compared. What I'm saying is probably random and slightly out of context with respect to the poem, but pain is simply, well, pain. It may be different in form, but it's felt the same. I think one of the biggest problems in the world is that people take their struggles as some kind of competition and victimize themselves. Here of course, you're antagonizing yourself and doing the opposite. I wish to convey that sometimes, it just is how it is.

Moving on, I really like how you described these little things happening while travelling on the road.

When I saw more; a spindly, freckled boy,
About seven, adorned by no mithril,
But still a knight in his own right, daring -
To slay those scared and static beasts of mud,
Mirthful and without a care for himself.