Young Writers Society

Hey llobalito08!

Okay! So, this is a really interesting poem. There were a couple errors, so I'll point those out first.

They we're in a quiet bar, shortly after mid-night.

We're is a contraction of we are, and doesn't work here - I think you mean were? Also, midnight is one word. No hyphen.

His eyes revealed, the savage beneath.

No comma here! But, if you want the reader to pause at that point, you can always make it a new line, like so:

His eyes revealed
the savage beneath.

The way poetry is read, we'll pause automatically at the end of each line, but the comma just makes us go "huh?"

They we're moments too late

Again, no apostrophe for were.

So! One of the great things about poetry is that you can disregard the punctuation rules. Well, mostly. It's not so good to insert random punctuation, but rather you CAN take punctuation out - it doesn't have to be grammatically correct. It's all about how the words sound, which gives you license to format and punctuate however you want!

What's my point? Well, I noticed that almost every line is ended with a period. It makes the poem very choppy and breaks it up, so I find it harder to concentrate on the words. You could replace them with commas, semicolons, or nothing at all, because you don't need it at the end of every line. Of course, it's all up to you! But just no that there are no rules, per se.

Other than that, I found this poem disturbing (as the other reviewer pointed out) but in a...good way. It's creepy, but it's interesting. The only comment about the story, then, is that I wasn't sure exactly what you were talking about. They're in a bar, and obviously the wife is unhappy, which leads me to think that the husband is bad. Okay. Then he randomly kills this other guy. Okay, so maybe he's crazy. But then you say her deceit. But we don't really know what that deceit is. I assume she cheated on her husband with the other man...? But I think it would be good to make that clearer, insert some eye contact between wife and other man, drop clues, etc.

Good work! Keep writing, PM me if you have any questions.

Hello, llobalito8! Since no one has decided to review on this poem, I have decided to give it a shot.

Very interesting scenes depicted here. I can vividly picture the events happening and the looks on the man and woman's faces. Your word choice really makes things stand out.

There is a problem with your first stanza. Well, at least I think so. I think it would be best if you put the rest of the sentences in another line. Like this:

The two sat in peaceful silence.
They we're in a quiet bar,
shortly after mid-night.
The man had a beer,
while his wife held her tears.

In the next stanza, you should use commas instead of periods. It just makes it seem too abrupt. But, if that is the way you want it to feel like, then by all means, forget what I suggested.

His face showed no expression.
At least one hard to read.

I think you need to use one of these, ; , (I'm always forgetting what they're called.) Semi-colon maybe?

He would look to his right.
He would glance to his left.
He scanned the whole room.
He found his old friend.

Ah! Forced rhyme here.

Suddenly her spouse rose.
Lent her a kiss on the cheek.
Grasped his beer bottle.
Sprung like a beast.

Once again, use commas instead of periods, please!

Overall, I found this poem to be a bit disturbing. But, what can I say? I love disturbing (some) poems. All that really needs to be changed here is to delete some of those periods and replace them with commas. It would really make the poem flow better.

Also, try to stay with one rhythm. It seems to me as if you are switching them around a lot and that makes it hard to read.

Please keep writing!

Becca