Published August 27, 2013
When people ask me
how i am?
They expect me to say
I am fine
But how can i say that
When the truth is that i am not fine
But,
Do people really want to know about my troubles
all my trials,travails and struggles
Do they want to know
that i can't pay my rent
or the fact that i can't
pay back the money i was lent
Do they want to know that
I have not eaten
or that if i don't bring
back a certain profit after hawking,i get beaten
Do they want to know that
I can't get pregnant
or that after 10 years of hard work
i still feel stagnant
Do they want to know that
I have only 1 jeans and shirt to wear
or that i was born with partial blindness
that's why i can't see clear
Do they want to know that
I was wrongfully arrested
or that as a pretty young girl
I have been raped and molested
Do they want to hear that
I can't pay my school fees
or that i am paralyzed
because i fell down from a tree
Do they want to know that
because i stood for my rights i got fired
or that i cry every night on my pillow
because 3 years ago my mom died
Do they want to know that
my uncle comes in my room every night to touch me
or that when the thieves broke in
they had their way with me
The truth is that
people don't want to know
because they have their own troubles too
So when people ask me
"HOW ARE YOU?"
I just smile
Look them in the eye
and tell them
"I AM FINE"
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Canary word: Present
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140,094 Literary Works • 672,998 Reviews
I loved the poem, I really did. But I can't read it. You need to practice a little poem-structure (is that a word?).
First off, you need to make paragraphs or stanzas. You basically need to make a few spaces to make a "pause" in the reading. This helps to create a feel of suspense, and it makes it all much more readable.
Secondly, there are a few grammatical errors. I saw in the earlier reviews that they commented it as well, but I might as well underline it.
When you say "I", you always have to capitalize.
Also, all first letters need to be capitalized.
Pretty basic, but some find it important.
But the one grammatical error I found annyoing myself, is your use of commas. I know commas are supposed to indicate a pause, but they can't stand there alone.
You wrote:
"all my trials,travails and struggles".
Here is an example of several errors that happen throughout the text.
You have to capitalize "all", as it is in the start of a sentence.
"trials,travails and struggles"
Commas. It should be written like:
"trials, travails and struggles"
Also, as this is obviously at the end of a stanza, you should have punctuation. So the correct sentence would be:
"All my trials, travails and struggles." To most, this would give more rythm just because of the fixes.
"1 jeans" should be "one pair of jeans". You can't say "jeans" in singular, so you have to add something to explain it. Also, all numbers from one to thirteen should not be written as numbers, but instead with letters. (this is in Norwegian rules, so I don't know how it is in English.)
But if you had fixed those errors, this would be, by far, my favourite poem of all time. It was emotional, serious, and it also had a morale.
I hope that you will continue writing, cause I really want to read more from you.
I hope this was not to harsh, and if it was, I apologize, but that is just how I review.
Love, Bob Walker
thanks
This is one of my favorite poems I have read on here. I enjoyed it and the harsh truth you told us straightforward. It was beautiful in a chilling and sad way. You did wonderful!
thanks kevikur...by the way,nice avatar
Hello, Kristina here to give you my feedback
First of all, I like your poem. It sounds interesting, and throughout the poem, I felt sorry for the narrator to have such bad experiences.
But I have to give you some suggestions, and correct you as well.
I see that your poem is built on one "whole stanza." I would suggest that next time you write a poem, keep in mind to divide the poem into different stanzas (paragraphs). I felt like this poem was divided into stanzas, but you refused to do it. Let me give you an example of the first paragraph how it should be.
"When people ask me
How I am
They expect me to say
I am fine"
Then, leave some space here and start the second stanza (paragraph), and continue like that till the end.
You may wonder why I am emphasising on stanzas. The reason is, that when your poem is divided into different stanzas, the readers will enjoy reading it more, and of course, they will understand the significance and image of your poem more. While reading, the readers can take a small break and reflect about the subject.
Moreover, with the help of paragraphs, nobody will feel lost reading your poem.
Because, at times, I felt sort of "lost" when reading your poem, especially in the beginning. I was reading the "first paragraph" and it gave me an expression that you were going to end the sentence, but instead, you continued with the flow and I felt 'lost', because I was not sure whether that part continued with the beginning or the next part. I am talking about this part:
"When people ask me
how i am?
They expect me to say
I am fine
But how can i say that
When the truth is that i am not fine
But,
Do people really want to know about my troubles
all my trials,travails and struggles"
Do not take this as an offense, I am telling you this to improve! Because your poem sounds nice, so it should have a "nice" and understandable structure.
At times you wrote "I" in lower case, whereas it should be written in upper case. ALWAYS. No matter what you are writing about. Keep that in mind, because it is really important when it comes to writing.
I want to get your attention about the beginning of the poem;
"But how can i say that
When the truth is that i am not fine
But,
Do people really want to know about my troubles."
I feel that the word "but" was out of subject in the second verse of this paragraph. Because you didn't include in a verse with other words. For example, the first verse is good, because it says "But how can I say that". So next time, be more careful.
So, keep on writing and be careful.
You're a good writer.
-Kristina-
Hey there. Change here to review your poem!
To start off, I'd like to say the concept of your poem is really good. "I am fine" is just an automatic reaction for a lot of people because either they think the other person won't want to know, or they don't want to tell, so good job picking a topic a lot of people can relate to.
You need to capitalize. Every time you use "I" it needs to upper case, plus just grammatically, you have no punctuation at all which is an issue. Even in a poem we need to know when we should pause or when a sentence ends. This means adding periods, commas, question marks, whatever's needed.
I think this line is fine without repeating that word. I do have a question about the rhyme scheme though. I noticed about half way through that you actually have one, but up to then I didn't realize it was rhyming at all. Partly, I think that's because the rhymes aren't clear, and partly it's because the first few lines actually don't rhyme. If a poem has a rhyme scheme it is better to be consistent and stick with it the whole way through, otherwise starting off without one and then suddenly starting one confuses and disrupts the flow of everything.
This line line isn't really needed at all, and if it's taken out it won't mess up anything because up until the 10th line there isn't really a pattern at all. If there is a pattern then it isn't clear because there is no stanza separation and no punctuation.
I struck through "about" just because the syllable count sounds better without it. Some poems don't have to have the same amount of syllables, and this one of course does not have to be exact, but the more even each line is to the next the better. To me this poem seems to sound better that way. It's lyrical and does end up developing a rhyming scheme so you should try to keep the counts of each line close to each other at least.
I think this line break was a bit awkward and would sound better like it's shown above.
I got the impression she was a teenager. Does that mean she's been working since she was 8?
"1 jeans" isn't grammatically correct. Also, a side note, you should type out any number under 10.
This feels a little redundant just because it already mentioned she can't pay her debt out or give back loans.
I don't want to feel harsh, especially cause these things could happen, but it feels like a few of these events were dropped in there to make the poem longer. Really, she was raped and beaten and then beaten by thieves and she's partially blind but also paralyzed. And all of these things are very sad and could very well happen but it felt too much like someone was trying to depress me instead of telling a life story of trials and hardships.
The ending is very strong and really conveys the emotion you were going for. The purpose and passion in this poem are very clear so well done.
Overall the punctuation is huge like I said, mostly it's missing commas and then question marks since the whole work is pretty much inquisitive. I actually really like this fact. Asking questions like this over and over is a good way for dramatic emphasis and to show people how to be sorry for you but not seem like you're sorry for yourself. Well done in that aspect. Like I said in the beginning, it's an easy emotion to relate to, even if we don't always have issues as serious as this narrators, and because of her struggles, the poem becomes not only emotionally revealing but also personal and sort of gritty. You seem to be on the right track with this work so keep it up!
Change out
thanks
You can really feel the emotions in this poem. It is really beautiful and opens the eyes for some people that maybe thought that way. You can feel through your writing how much she is and have suffered. I really like the way you start and finish your poem. When I was reading it, it really touched my heart. Some people don't think of other people and ask "How are you," but the only answer they want is "I'm fine".
Truly beautiful!
thanks
Hey vjay!
I'm hanorah and I'll be reviewing your poem today!
So this is your first post? Let me tell you something, you killed it! I really don't know how you can escalate from this poem.
It was pretty morbid, I have to admit, but all the same I can imagine a young women's thoughts being like this.
I would normally come down on punctuation, but I actually think it looks better like this, nice work!
Oh, one thing I would change the everyone to 13+, but you can leave it if you want, it's your choice.
Great poem!
~keep writing
thanks
I absolutely love this! Honestly, so good. I can't even review because I don't see anything wrong with it. Amazing job
thanks,wow...didn't expect anything nice from anybody