Young Writers Society

Oooh, that is a sharp poem. Well done!

More specifically, it's a powerful piece. My favorite stanza would have to be the first, thanks to hemlock traditionally being used as poison and therefore having a bad reputation (particularly in the murder of Socrates, I believe?). It seems like almost a metaphor for abuse: providing harm to someone until they respond sweetly enough, as in the "blood smells sweet like summer kisses" line, for the abuser to take pride in themselves. Given the next two stanzas, this appears to be correct, as the abuser engages in plenty of emotional abuse. Because of this, I heavily sympathize with the protagonist, and their furious denouncing of the abuser and his/her tactics is glorious to read. My major issue with the piece, however, is the use of incogitant and kibitzer in the middle stanza. While they represent concepts that can't be so simply stated, my general rule is that I don't advocate using a word if I have to use a dictionary to know what it means. Hence, it may be better to remove them and rework the middle stanza. Beyond that, I would normally express some degree of disagreement with the line splits, some of which appear to be at crucial and awkward points, but I don't think I understand the proper use of line splits well enough to comment on them. I'd rather leave that to the more expert YWS poets/poet-reviewers.

Otherwise, everything here is solid. The speaker's bitterness, demonstrated by a wonderful use of italics, carries with it a sharp edge of determination mixed with an almost sarcastic demeanor ("i am bleeding"). The end result, carried through with the reuse of the hemlock metaphor, is a passionate and remarkable poem. So, all in all, thanks for writing this great piece!

I think the third stanza stands out among the three stanzas for me, personally. This line:

the seeds you sow in my wonded skin won't grow.
I will not let them.

is a gorgeous line. My favorite out of the piece. For me, it paints a picture of two stubborn, angry people and the third stanza at least illustrates a much more poignant emotional moment of being in that place where two people are angry, and even our best intentions, advice, or words are used against us, depicted by the "other" as weapons. I like how the speaker admits it too: I will not let them. Such powerful words. There is pride and stubbornness on both sides, and I like how at least it is illustrated here in the third stanza. I get the sense that the poem speaks of two people, an "I" and a "you", I am pointing that out only because sometimes "you" can stand for "society" but I don't think that's the case here at all, so I am ruling that out completely.

So, to make clear my interpretation, I definitely see it as there's a character in here "you" who apparently likes to stab ears and smell blood (probably metaphorically xD ) and then there's the speaker, who at least admits in the end of their own pride/stubbornness.

One thing, I felt really uncomfortable while reading this piece. I think the point of view may be working towards that end in the poem.

There's a lot of anger, bite, and sarcasm that is directed outwards from the get go. And I don't get the chance to see who it is directed towards. The poem is only one point of view, first-person, so the narration itself is unreliable, and the feelings I walked away with is a sort of uncomfortableness, like listening in to one half of a conversation that should be directed towards someone that is clearly not me, the reader.

There's the speaker, who is clearly angry and the person who the speaker is angry at, and the problem here, is that the poem mixes the "you" (object of anger) together along with imperatives commands. Imperative being a communication that speaks to its recipient. If I were to write:

Pause.
Reflect.
Draw me a picture.

The "you" used in imperative voice is the recipient, whoever it is who is listening to that command, or in the case of writing, whoever it is who happens to be reading.

So, your poem opens with imperative right away, meaning that as a reader I am directly participating- "stitch me up with hemlock arrangements", that's MY role as a reader. And there is this uncomfortable role that the writing shifts onto ME by getting me to play as this target of the speaker's anger, and I'm not very appreciative of not being given a more fleshed out or proper role. How about my side of the story, huh?

What if I was only trying to make the speaker feel better, and this stubborn speaker is now calling me a vampire and a kibitzer out of spite, I probably didn't mean to make the speaker feel as a victim. Like, who does this speaker think he or she is? ;-P

Overall, the piece rattles and irrates. And it may be the intention that it was going for!

I hope this helps! Let me know if you'd like to chat this one out.

~ as always, Audy

I'm guessing that you are in a psychologically and verbally abusive relationship with someone, because I've had a person like that in my life before. These scenes are all too familiar, them putting pride and self over everyone else, not caring about what they say, not caring about the hurt they sow.

Hello! HBC speeding by for a review!

My first impression of this poem is that someone hurt the person in this poem, and the person who did the hurting is trying to make it better ineffectively. But then as I read the poem over again, I see that I was right about there being a person doing the hurting, but they aren't trying to help. They sound arrogant, and the speaker resents them. They just want to look like they do good, wear that "gold sticker" but in reality, they've made your life worse.

The speaker doesn't take it though, and makes that clear in the last stanza. They will not be influenced by the negative hurtful arrogant person. And then the hemlocks on the grave are a nice throwback to the beginning of the poem

Only critique here is capitalization. The first word of each line should be capitalized.

Good job!