Each day runs by, each night crawls on,
Summers shiver and wrinkle as it’s briskly undone
I saw faces in pools glittering below sunlight
And heard many a thing when a raven took flight.
I am not what you’d remember, I’m no sweet child
Nor heartless nor cold, nor flaky nor mild
I am twisted and dead, yet I’m different inside
I have claimed such horrid things, but here; let me describe
I have said many a thing, how my mind eats me up
As if my heart was but a hard porcelain cup
I have gone on and on about raging battles in my head
But truth is, I feel a deal less alive and a deal more dead
Here is mine own description, if you’d care to listen
My insides are as empty as a hollow moon which glisten
No light comes from me, raging battles? None to see
A bleeding heart of despair? No. That is not me
I am dead, and shrivelled, and hollow as a tomb
My words are cold as they are empty, dying in their womb
I am no one, bound to die; immortality is far
But if so.. where comes this heat? This smoldering scar?
Empty, I may be. But beware, for I am a fallen star!
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Hey there silvermoon17! I'm here to review your poem, as I promised. Sorry it took me so long! I've been pretty busy this past week!
because it made me think of time travel, and it really got the point across that summer, which is the brightest of seasons, full of joy, is bunching up together and passing so quickly that the narrator isn't able to enjoy it. I'm not sure if this is what you were going for, but that's how I took it!So I really dig some of the imagery you're putting out. You use specific words that create just the right picture in my head. It's the best part of the poem! My favorite image was
That being said, there are a few things that need to be addressed.
The first recommendation I'll make is to break this up into stanzas. The YWS editor can be tricky, so I'll let you in on a secret. If you hold shift while you enter down for a new line, it'll be single spaced. To create a break between stanzas, simply don't hold shift while you press enter. I think that breaking this up into stanzas would be nice to separate ideas. Right now, it feels a little rambling, so breaking it up from one big chunk of text would be a relief to the reader.
There are several instances of forced rhyme in this piece. From your reviews, I understand how partial you are to rhyme in poetry, but no rhyme is better than forced rhyme. A forced rhyme is grasping at straws to keep your pattern going, even at expense of the meaning of the poem.
This instance is probably the most glaring. If you continued the metaphor with the cup, developed it a little more, explained more, this might not seem so forced, but you never mention the cup again in the poem. You simply decided to rhyme "cup" with "up," but didn't really think about how much that strange image would take the reader out of the realm of the poem.
Instead of this, try changing the wording of both lines of the couplet. You could easily change to something like or
Using something else to rhyme with is going to open you up to a more reasonable image in the second line. Don't always fall in love with the first rhyme you find. When you use rhyme in poetry, there's a fine line to walk between rhythmic and singsong.
I'm not sure why you chose to use "mine" instead of "my" in this section. The rest of your poem doesn't sound archaic, so why would you switch tone for one line, then switch back again? This comes off as cheesy, or as if the narrator is trying to be overly dramatic. For a serious poem, I'd stay away from thou and thine.
Another line that came off as less than serious was the last line. Yelling "beware!" seems more Scooby-Doo and less formidable fallen star. I'd change these instances because the tone really took me out of the world of the poem.
Let me talk to you about meter. You have a rhyme scheme here, but your flow is still off because meter wasn't given enough attention here. Meter is the rhythm of poetry, and is especially important in rhyming poetry.
Meter is made up of rhythms of stressed and unstressed syllables. There are quite a few different types of meter, but poets usually try to stay fairly consistent throughout the poem to create a pleasing rhythm. Here, you've got the potential to get comfortable in meter, but you've got a ways to go.
I'll talk to you about two types of meter at the moment, though I'll link you to an article with even more meter types! We're going to talk about Iambic and Trochaic meter here. A set of each of these syllables is called a foot. Each set in these two meters is two syllables. Iambic meter starts with an unstressed syllable, and is followed by a stressed syllable. An example of an iambic foot is the word "aWAY." A troche is the opposite; it's a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable. An example of a trochaic foot is the word "AFter." So a stressed syllable is where you place the emphasis in a word. In your poem, you definitely use both iambic and trochaic feet in different places, though the meter does not stay consistent throughout. I'd love to see a more consistent rhythm from this poem.
One example of where you use almost perfect iambic meter is here:
If we do just a little tweaking, we can get it perfectly iambic.
I literally just took out the as before cold, and we have alternating stressed and unstressed syllables. It's really pleasing for a reader to have in front of them-- an iambic pattern was used by Billy Shakespeare in his works because it sounds natural when you read it normally.
When you revise this poem, try putting all your lines into iambs or troches. The extra work will be worth it in the end!
If you're interested in different kinds of meter, this page has quite a few examples!
Overall, I think this poem has some really lovely potential! You're on the right track with imagery, and now it's down to refining the tone, the meter, and the rhyme. I hope that this review proves useful to you! If you have any questions, feel free to ask me. I'd love to talk poetry some time! Keep writing, and don't forget to keep YWSing!
this is an absolutely beautiful piece. I have read many of you're poems and noticed you are good at creating a sort of melancholy hope in your work. you are an amazing writer.
a few things I noticed:
"I have gone on and on about raging battled in my head"
I would rephrase this sentence as it has no subject I would recommend saying "A raging battle" or "the raging battles" instead of just "raging battled"
"But truth is, I feel much less alive and a deal more dead"
I would add "great" before "deal" to clarify the sentence.
"Here is mine own description, if you’d care to listen"
replace "mine" with "my".
"My insides are as empty as a hollow moon which glisten"
I would rephrase this as "as empty, as hollow as the moons glisten".
"My words are cold as they are empty, dying in their womb"
add "as" before "cold".
"But if so.. where comes this heat? This someldering scar?"
add "from" before where. also, you used ".." instead of "..." and you misspelled "smoldering"
overall, I am a huge fan of your work. as always, my critiques are only meant to help you.
keep writing
~Corvus
Yo thanks! I actually made an error at the (ragin battled), that literally makes no sense, I actually meant raging battleS. Mine is because.. it gives a more ancient and more set back way, and mine is a much cooler way of putting it in.
For the moon thing, well no since the comparison doesn%u2019t work otherwise.
Again, an error for th next
And thanks for it anyways!
Thanks again for pointing out these horrible mistakes! I can%u2019t thank you enough!