*These are the first two poems I have ever written ( both entitled, Burn) I know it's not too great, but go easy. They are based on prompt's I received focusing on life and death for the first, as well as self-harm and mental illness denial for the second. All with a theme of fire as well.*
Poem One:
I often wait for the day
when the fire will come through the door
and we will be forced to feel the burn.
I don’t want this day to come,
but it looms in the back of mind.
I often wait for the day
when I will take my last breath,
my last dance in my own skin.
As the smoke fills our lungs
and the flames char our flesh.
I want to dance while i’m waiting for the fire.
A smile on my face,
no tears to douse the flames.
I want to dance while i’m waiting for the fire.
I want to feel like i’m on fire before i’m on fire.
I want to live like a bird before i’m on fire.
I want to dance
before I burn.
Poem Two:
His hand burned as the crackling flame carried on its own rhythm.
It did its job, unaware of how to stop, not knowing the pain it caused (or the joy).
He took his hand back and put it in the bucket of ice water.
Stepping forward onto the hot coals, he thought of how he wanted to know what it felt like:
the pain of burnt flesh.
He already knew, but he wanted to feel it again.
He wanted to know what it smelled like:
the smell of burnt flesh.
He already knew, but he wanted to smell it again.
He took a step back and sat on the ground, putting his feet in the bucket of ice water.
He pinched his own lips and scratched his own arm.
Knives were out of the question.
That would make it too real.
He saw the sun on the horizon and wanted to take it in his hand.
That would be the ultimate burn.
He could see the webs of his fingers, charred and ripped open.
In his experience that was the worst kind of pain (the best, the ghostly absence of thought).
He hadn’t seen his mother in who knows how long.
The man in the living room was nothing but marble.
He could still see the sun on the horizon.
He could even feel it.
On the horizon,
in his hand,
he felt it.
And he put his hand in the bucket of ice water.
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,857 Reviews
Hey Pacific2016,
Welcome to Review Days on YWS! Review day is a 24 hour window where YWS teams up together to try to clean the Green Room where all works with less than 2 reviews go when they are published.
That being said, also welcome to YWS! You joined at just the right time. So here on YWS we prefer to have reviews written in a sandwich style. Let me show you how it goes as I review these two poems!
First, the Top Bun, The Good!
I really like how the first poem uses sentences across lines, and it isn't constrained to end punctuation, I think that's a huge stylistic benefit for that poem. You also use capitalization in a way that benefits the poem because the poem is about a sad topic, about knowing that the end is coming and it's only a matter of time, so the lowercase for "i" is well-used too.
Second, the Meat/Toppings, The Potential Improvements
First thing first, here! Have a resource!
How to Format Poetry
This is a link to an article I wrote about how to structure a poem how you want it on YWS with many different options for how to get it to do what you want. I have a feeling you probably didn't intend to have every line be a stanza, but that it was either one long stanza, or the first one was probably multiple small stanzas, but that YWS stole that from you. Well, now you can have it back =D! The easiest way to fix it is to paste your poem and then erase all the line breaks to make it a single paragraph, then use "ctrl+Enter" to do line breaks, and "Enter" to do stanza breaks.
Okay, let's move on to talking about the poems themselves. I feel like the second poem could've benefited from the stylistic grammar choices you used in the first poem, lack of end-punctuation favoring stanza punctuation, and loose capitalization focused mostly on where it's needed not where it's "supposed to be" grammatically. This would give less of a rigid feel to the poem and give it more flow through the lines. I suggest to most poets not to put dead stops at the end of lines unless they're powerful because it invites the reader into the empty white space next to the poem, which often leads to a tab or a phone or some other distraction. It makes it easy to quit reading.
In the first poem you do this really well with the punctuation only being where it would be needed in an actual sentence, and that makes the poem clear and flow well. The second one could use that a bit more.
Third, The Bottom Bun, The Conclusion
Overall, I really liked your poems, I thought they had some great use of punctuation in the first one and I'd love to see you do that with the second one. There's a lot here to talk about from the rich details and repetition in the first one, to the strong metaphor in the second one that is followed through nicely, but overall, keep writing!
Keep playing with punctuation and capitalization too! If you're ever unsure of what you should write or if something is "legal" in a poem, here is a link to the index of articles YWS has on Poetry itself. They're a great dive if you feel like reading about the craft and usually people don't stumble on it for a while on YWS, and then they regret not knowing about it, so I figured I'd share early!
Poetry Tutorials Article Index
Hey, there!
Okay, these poems are very intense. Very well-written. I was riveted to the screen, scrolling, reading, FEELING everything. You did so well in conveying the emotions of self-harm and mental illness.
At first, I'll admit, the repetitive phrases in poem one were a little confusing. Seemed a little bit amateur, almost (although we both that's not true for these pieces, like, at all). However, as I continued to read it clicked in my mind and instead of a flaw, I started seeing the repetition as a strength that really, REALLY fit into the theme of the poems. It helped so much with what you were trying to convey, and the emotions really shone for me right there. I want to congratulate you on that because most people really can't pull it off and come out sounding annoying. Not you, though. You seared the words into my mind and pulled me closer to the page.
Real talk, right now. I've experienced things like this before. I've had friends who have experienced things like this before. This is so raw and real and I really just want to thank you for being so honest about what this is like. It's a real problem for depression and self-harm to be misrepresented and I'm glad your words ring true.
Another thing: I hardly saw any mistakes in your works. Good job.
Can't wait to read more of your art!
-M