reflections

Hey there lolosboing and a somewhat late welcome to YWS!i started reviewing this awhile ago but I finally just found it in my drafts again. Usually I wouldn't review something with 3 critiques already but why not? It's revmo after all.

This poem looks a little bit different from the one I started reading a month ago, so I just decided to delete my entire last draft. It might not be but before I thought I remembered there being more of a difference between the capitalization and punctuation. The constant changing here is still pretty distracting and as far as I can tell, doesn't have any literary value. I would recommend keeping to the pattern of starting with caps, comma, no caps in second line and ending with a period. The uniformness of it kinda makes the distant thoughts stick together better.

The bits of rhyme scheme here and there also put me off, because you start out strong and then quickly fall into the abyss. You definitely could have handled rhyming 'song' better at the end of each line if you wanted to or really you could have adapted a consistent ABAB. The second option would take a bit more effort on your part, but unless you want to switch this more to free verse, I'd recommend working on the rhyming.

Story idea seems romantically based which to be honest I was expecting when clicking on this. The speaker is obviously rethinking or 'reflecting' as the title leads us to believe, on this different time and a possible love. Once it came down to reflecting on reflecting and the enigma/puzzle/burrito switch flipped on I found it to be a bit more interesting. Or at least easier to follow through with while trying to understand the meaning as a whole. Some of the lines forced by the rhyme don't match in stride with the theme you're trying to roll with, so there's another reason to change it. If I really had to apply a number scale, I'd go 3/5 for average material with a good effort behind it.

Yeah that's all I've got got tonight. Maybe I'll make it back to some of your other poems later on.
For now, Happy #RevMo .
~Lizzy

This was such a well-formatted poem. I interpreted it to be about how beauty is proved through what we create, not what is seen by others. Your perspective, as the writer, discovered and assured that. Your rhymes were fitting and consistent, which made me enjoy the piece even more! My only critique would be elaborating more on your relationship to the person, the significance of the "gong," etc. Otherwise, great!

Hi there lolsoboing! This is Kays here dropping in for a review on this lovely day.

I can see that this poem is on the more minimalist side seeing as this is only eight lines long and made entirely of couplets. The structure here reminds me a little of a Ghazal though I know this isn't a Ghazal because while the rhyme scheme there is AA bA cA dA eA until the poem is finished, the last word of the second line in each stanza is supposed to be the same. I'm not going to assume too much or put that on the poem without knowing but this seems to be a failed Ghazal--I can see that the meter here is pretty even (though that's only a requirement for traditional Ghazals) and that this is generally structured like a Ghazal but there are a couple of rules that are broken which is why I'm confused. Just in case you were, here is how to write a Ghazal.

Moving on from that little tangent, there isn't actually a whole lot to say about this poem. The rhyme scheme doesn't add or subtract from the piece--it's just kinda there and for that I'm going to suggest playing around with that element. Furthermore there's generally not a lot going on here. There's nothing that particularly stands out and there's nothing that makes this necessarily bad either, this just exists. If there's a redeeming quality to this, it's the humor that comes in with the speaker telling 'you' not to worry.

I'm going to assume that 'you' doesn't matter in this poem or to be more specific, we don't need to know the relationship between the speaker and 'you' to find enjoyment? The part about the gong and reflections is clever. Nice job on that but there's not much more to say than that. Elaborating for a better effect is a possible action to take if you're going to edit this though for the most part this is simple and a little silly and if that's what you're aiming for, you've succeeded. Going into more depth about the reflection is again, a possibility for a perhaps better outcome though this works for what this is even though I'm not dazzled or on the floor laughing. Overall for what this is, this is nice but nothing too special.

If you have any questions, don't be afraid to ask! Have any more review requests? Be sure to check out my Will Review For Food thread! I hope I helped and have a great day.

Short and sweet, I think. Maybe. Probably? Yeah. I guess. I theorize? There seems to be a story here, I have no idea what the story is, but it's there. I would try elaborating more with this piece if you continue working on it, try to explain why exactly this person the character is talking to, their connection, story.

Thanks for sharing, keep writing.

MrTalljoker, Poetry.
Forever.