Young Writers Society

Heyo~

I love your username. Great band.

Let's dive in, shall we?

I see from a response you left on a review below that this is about witch trials. That's an interesting subject to write about. They were horrible, and they're a good basis for literature.

That being said, if I were to read the poem without that bit of knowledge, I would not know that this poem is about witch trials. It's from the point of view of someone who I assume is being accused and persecuted for being a witch, but again, there's no evidence within the poem to suggest that. You need to illustrate a little more of the situation in order for the reader to understand what's going on.

I like the atmosphere that you create here, and I think you could easily slip in a little something about being hunted. I'm not sure if the angel is sad because people are being hunted for being witches, or if the angel is sad because of witches. I think that distinction would be helpful, as well.

Also, a note on line breaks. Try to end a line on a strong word, and don't break a line in the middle of a phrase.

Angelic forms wrought in panes of glass loom as

Hello!

I really feel like "oblivious" is not the right word. Like, I'm not sure exactly what you were getting at, but I feel like you might've been trying to say something along the lines of like, a "painful heaven" or some other oxymoron like that. "oblivious" means: "not aware of or not concerned about what is happening around one." And in this poem, you basically just describe the place around this person, so it's kind of exactly the opposite of oblivious. It's like a "hyperaware heaven" almost

I did like the first couple lines a lot. The image of "slender beams of accusation" is really good. Reminds me of the guilt people feel when thinking of their immortal soul sometimes.

You have some good images here, but you also have some weak ones, and the way you mush the whole thing together is a little bit awkward ans sounds like you're trying to be poetic. You don't want to /try/ to be poetic. You want your poetry to sound natural!

Some words and phrases I found to be particularly guilty of trying to sound poetic, or just plain cliche, are:
"always in pain, always sorrowful," - you can still express that the person is in pain, but this is over the top and cliche.
"Angelic forms wrought in panes of glass loom" - this is a pretty good image, but compared to the rest of the poem, this is like, way too many heavy words packed into one phrase. It's just a really heavy line.
"forming an image in my mind," - so this is okay, I guess, but in a pretty concrete and understandable poem, you leave the reader wondering what the image is. What picture does the dust create? you mention it, so it must be important, but for the life of me, I can't guess what it is.
"penetrating my darkened soul." - generally "soul" seems cliche to me, although we are talking about a church here, but then again you did say "darkened soul" which screams even more cliche to me. Could you word this differently so it's less cliche? "penetrating" is also a bit heavy for something as vague as this line.
"Pain on an angel’s face." - this little fragment seems completely out of place. What the heck are you talking about? It's so vague and unexplained and not grammatically correct and cliche. this line is definitely my least favorite line in the poem. I'm sure it could be better if it made more sense in context, but right now it sounds like you just threw it in to be dramatic.
And you already heard my grievance about "oblivious".

Despite all this, the poem flows pretty well and I like the dark mood of it. The length isn't too long, so it keeps the reader's attention. I like the formatting and such.
Really, this has a lot going for it, but all the little picky things really hold it back in my opinion.

Let me know if you need any help editing this or with poetry in general. I'm always happy to help!
Keep writing!
~fortis

I really liked the imagery in this poem!
The slender beams of accusation are a really cool image. The angelic forms wrought in panes of glass is also really cool. The language is mature and expertly controlled. It's well structured and intense.
Keep making these gothic poems!
I like em'