finale

Hi there nykolas,

I noticed your poem has been in the Green Room for quite a while, so I thought I'd drop by with a quick review for you! First I just want to say that this poem is about some pretty heavy feelings, so if this reflects how you're feeling in real life, I'd encourage you to talk to someone you trust or check out an online resource such as https://www.crisistextline.org/. <3

I agree with VintageGirl that you made some very effective formatting and stylistic choices in this poem. The lowercase capitalization and the lack of punctuation makes it feel like the narrator has given up too much to try, like they're exhausted and defeated. The short line length and the broken flow between the lines also matches that feelings really well; given the subject, it wouldn't necessarily make sense for the poem to be all flowy and beautiful and smooth to read.

My favourite line(s) would have to be "i can't feel the cut / but i can feel the tears" -> the simple, stark contrast of feeling the one but not feeling the other is really devastating and impactful. I also enjoyed the personification of death - I think given that the rest of the poem is pretty literal, the way that death is given a character adds a bit more of a poetry-feel to the poem. I find it interesting how you depict the narrator's struggle with themself as a struggle with someone else (death); I think it shows how difficult and complicated a decision this is for the narrator, and how much internal conflict there is in their mind. So much so that it feels as though there are two "people" fighting over this decision, the narrator and death.

My only critique is that the depiction of death feels a bit cliche; we all know and have seen the image of death as a person in a cloak holding a scythe. And typically in poetry it is best to avoid cliches as much as possible, or put a thoughtful new spin on them. Otherwise, they become very overused and actually start to lack very much meaning. You can check out this article on cliches for more info if you like! Overall though, I would just suggest you try to put a new spin or evoke a new image of death for the reader. Maybe death is a barber with scissors who comes to snip away bits of a person's life. Maybe a sewer with a seam ripper who slowly tears their fabric of life to shreds. Obviously those are just random ideas off the top of my head; I'm sure you could think of something better and more relevant to the poem!

All in all, this was a serious poem but I did enjoy reading it. I think you do a great job of conveying and depicting some very complex, uncomfortable feelings. You also made a lot of smart choices when it comes to formatting, style, etc.! I hope this review is helpful for you, and if there's anything you'd like me to go over, just let me know!

Best,
Seirre

Wow. Okay. I feel weird saying this is a good poem because of what it's about, but it definitely is written well. So. Here we go.

First of all, I like how there are no upper-case letters. I feel like it adds to the poem in a way I can't describe. I can feel the desperation of the narrator, I guess.

I have one suggestion. What if you added a little more punctuation? Just after the final "please." I feel like it would make it seem more final, as the poem is named finale. The period would show the end. I like the choice of minimal punctuation everywhere else, but I think the period would add to it a little bit?

I'm don't know, just something to think about. Again, I liked the poem

-VG