Upon this blank page I write,
Riddling it with scratch mark
Drenching the poor beaut in ink
Telling about this and that,
Every line does it's damage.
Poor beaut, poor thing
I tattoo you with some of me.
May it horrible; may it brilliant
May it burn; may it hail
This blank page contains me,
And in the end, when wit,
When word and technique expire
You'll be left poor beaut.
Ink stained with throbbing pain,
And me; gone, gone, gone.
I'll be nothing at all.
But you, you will always live:
Tragic inked page.
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140,138 Literary Works • 673,032 Reviews
This poem is beautiful.
) but of how the emotions was conveyed and I say YES! - I felt it.
I know that this wouldn't help a lot, but I hope a little help will do. 
I would've not thought about how "writing" would have a connection with "love".
Truly, the opening was fantastic! It was a process of how writers begin to write. Then as the poem goes on, it conveys how the outputs turn out "May it horrible; may it brilliant
May it burn; may it hail". But it didn't only end there, the connection of pain incurred in love is also evident in the opening up to the middle. On the closing part was a realization, a brilliant realization.
Truly, I think I would' not judge this poem as of its techniques and everything (because I think I'm not yet pro.
That's it!
Here I am for your second secret santa review, but let's not talk a lot about that. Let's talk about the poem!
I like it. Most meta pieces focus on the philosophy of the thing or what it means to be a writer emotion-wise, intent-wise, but you've got a poem that is concerned with the physicality of putting words to paper, and that's refreshing.
The first thing, though, is that these three lines have got to go:
They are just repeating what you said in the previous few lines and weakening the ending of "gone gone gone" -- which is lovely in that the repetition asks us to hold on to the idea, like an echo, but it's still claiming the end of existence in its meaning.
The other thing I'd like to see would be a choice between talking about the page as an "it" and talking directly to it. You start with "it", but then change to "you", and it's jarring. The poem would be more effective if you made a choice.
Despite that, I love that even though the only colors your poem evokes are black and white, they're crisp and have texture. Texture in a poem really draws your reader in, because we have to remember what the texture feels like to logically process the poem, but by remembering it, we're evoking a sensation within our body and becoming physically involved with the poem. It's great! I'd actually like to see even more of that~
Hope this review was also helpful.
Good luck, and always keep writing!
Plus remember to PM me if you have any questions or comments about my review.
Wow this was absolutely beautiful!
I actually have no right to review a writer of your caliber but anyways I'll just leave a little thought.
My favorite part of the poem is the ending, it brings everything to a standstill. I also love the clever contrast of "live" and "Tragic". Very original.
Don't think I could ever look at a blank page again without these words ringing in my ears.
I will not say "Well done"
just... Thank you
You're welcome, and thank you
This was very good and well written. You stayed on the same topic throughout the work, and for this I commend you because time and again I encounter writers whose work is, well, quite literally all over the page in their topics.
) semicolons (;) and periods [.]) And when there is a punctuation mark, the line ends.
My favorite line was easily: This blank page contains me,
It applies, I believe, to all serious writers.
Now, just a few things that I would like to mention. Typically, repetition in any literary work is a no-no, however, here I believe that it works. All except for 'poor beaut." Ever heard the saying, "Two's a company, three's a crowd?" Well, that saying applies here. Repeating it once or twice would have been good, but once you go over that its like, "Am I really reading this again?"
Last thing before I leave you. And this is simply a suggestion, and you may take it or you may leave it, whichever you prefer.
The typical rule of thumb in most poetry is to end every line with a punctuation mark (the most common are commas (,) colons
This is a stylistic choice that not all authors choose, however it is very common and something that I know I look at when I review.
Anywho, I'll get out of your hair now. Well, not literally but you know what I mean.
I hope this helps you in some way, and if it doesn't............Oh well!! I did my best.
Happy Writing!
HT
Sorry about the random smiley face by the way, I was attempting to put a colon there. [:]
Thank you for your review and time c:
Hello there!
Firstly, I very much like this poem. It is private and intense and a little sad, the way writing and being a writer feels to me. Now, I have to admit I haven't read anything else of yours (which I'll remedy soon, don't worry) so I'm unfamiliar with your style, and I don't want to suggest corrections that are irrelevant; for instance, punctuation.
"You'll be left poor beaut."
This line is the only one I can find that seems to be lacking a necessary comma, and I only mention it because it affected the way I read it.
I'm intrigued by your repetition of the word "beaut." It's not a word one sees or hears often, and I was about to say "you misspelled 'beauty'" but I really like it. It's old-fashioned and a tender-hearted endearment.
I agree with Dreamwalker on the line: "And me; gone, gone, gone." However, I'm at a loss as to alternatives. It just seems too quick and abrupt for the rest of the poem.
I'm kind of a free spirit when it comes to poetry; I understand there are rules but I don't follow them, so consistency or meter or anything like that hold no sway upon me. I really enjoyed this poem, and I'll end with my favorite bit:
"I tattoo you with some of me.
May it be horrible, may it be brilliant"
So lovely! Hope this helped.
~Laz
Thank you for your review! I'm glad you enjoyed the poem. I used "beaut" because I felt like every writer/poet looks on their works with an intense affection and the word beaut sort of came into my mind. Forgive my comma lol I'll fix that. The gone, gone, gone is meant to be read slow with the commas and period it's meant to slow down the poem. That's why the rest of the lines in the poem after it all have periods (mostly). The whole poem has gone slow. But I can see how it sort of a weird part and maybe there could be a better way to go about it. I hope you enjoy my other works! I completely agree with you on how you look at poetry. Poetry, in my mind, has no rules. Thanks again for your review!
Hello nmk1128. I don't think we've ever had occasion to meet, so I suppose now would be a good a time as any. Forgive my rust. I'm still getting used to the reviewing aspect again.
As for the poem, what I first found myself doing was trying to relay the message between what you left as your description and what you've given here. The 'what writing means' which I found almost strangely unanswered. The poem itself is less about the meaning and more about the futility of the act, which is a topic that stands well on its own and can be expounded upon in great detail by prose and poetry alike. Just, it kind of skewed me a bit seeing as I came in expecting answers to one question and being faced with truths of a whole different variance.
Now, the actual critique:
I want to start out with a bit of praise as is a habit of mine. Consistency is something so easily lost in writing in general, so it was nice to see you try and use your theme throughout the entirety of this, though gimmicky at some points. It was refreshing to see the harder metaphor used to get across that indifference. Because really, we as writers are indifferent towards the page. It is the word that suffers us, but more so, the page that suffers the burden of an uninteresting word. For that I definitely like the concept, and I'm quite happy to see the metaphor used on a few different platforms.
My biggest concern being isn't necessarily the topic, but the diction. Your word choices were sometimes haphazard. For instance, the use of repetition with both;
and
The gone, gone, gone was dragged out in a way the poem does not see fit to drag. You're precise in your shortness of lines, your quick jagged terms that give chase to the reader having their own attempts at piecing together a truth. Just, when you add something like this, it's almost as if that one line has been given a verbal ellipsis. You're dragging the thought out, making it almost mantra-like, which breaks off the continuity and, in turn, disrupts any chance of flow you had going. It's a good thing this choice of wording was used near the end or I should have found myself a little depleted by it.
As for the poor beaut, it seemed heavy-handed. A reaffirming sentiment that has been reaffirmed consistently by the topic itself. It reminds me of Brechtian theatre, that hammers you over the head with the topic. But theatre is prose, and poetry is subtle.
So cool down some of those unnecessary bits of repetition. Not necessary in getting your point across.
Some of the more interesting bits were when you talked of the tattooing quality of a writer's ink. Very contemporary for a poem that screamed 'old sport'. I'd like to see you abandon some of your more direct dialects and move into this fluid, metaphorical style. Not so quill and ink and more skin and regret. It relays better to an audience of younger youth who see a quill and think 'yes, indeed' but see a tattooing instrument and feel pain and regret. The difference between those two images is astoundingly clear, so I would use that as your secondary facet. This seems too one-faceted to be really strong on its own.
Right, I'm rambling.
Pretty much, what I would most like to see you do is abandon this very starchy style. Your work has obvious strength in the fact that it has metaphor and just a little ache to curve the edges somewhat, but there are still edges and contemporary poetry doesn't need to feel sharp. Be fluid and you'll find your work resounds with more power than a straight-forward style could ever depict.
If you have any questionS, feel free to let me know.
Much love, as always,
~ Walker
thank you for the review. I'm glad you could take the time to review this! You made a good point with the gone, gone gone thing to some degree. But I also like how it slows the poem down - it's meant to. I wanted to make the ending of the poem somewhat reflective for the reader, so every line would seem more important. This is the reason for the periods, but I can see the case you're making as well. By the way, always feel free to ramble! As for your advice on changing my style. No. I personally think this is a bad poem, but even so I'd rather write the way that come naturally when I come up with an idea for a poem than abandon what I know. Also I don't really edit poems. To some extent I do, but I believe that poems should be written in the spur of the moment and maybe tweaked a bit, but it loses something, I feel, if you mess with it to much. That's just my opinion. Thanks again and I really liked you're review and if you'd like anything reviewed I'd be happy to do so!