Okay so I write poetry quite a lot, but up until recently it was a strictly-for-me-only type of thing, so no one else ever saw them. But I decided there was no point doing them if I didn't know if I was any good at it or not, so I put them up on myspace, where everyone loved them.

So, I thought. Why not get some real opinions from the people here?
Here are my two favorites, critique is of course appriciated, although I would perfer you stick to grammatical aspects, order and word choice instead of the actual topics, they mean a lot me and I'd rather they not be torn to bits.

Here they are:

Destroyer:
It was like everything else that you touched
The silky petals of red and white
Curled with heat as the flame went up
Turning the flower to ashes,
The image in my mind
To an imprint when I closed my eyes
I knew beauty had left it then
Just like it had left you.
In a flash of flames then
A slow burning
Until all that was left
Was your skeleton
With no sugar-coated pill protection
To keep us all from seeing you,
As you really are.
A transparent ghost.


3D:
There are so many different versions of me
The people here have never seen.
And my thoughts, my emotions
I let them run free
The anger in my feet
The sadness through my veins
The courage in my blood
The ambition in my brain.
I always knew that no matter
How much I moved
The world would stay the same
It’s the thoughts and actions
That really change
Our perception
And our range.
I can have every thought from every moment
Played back over and over
I can let it all roll away,
The stress on my shoulders.
But I’m putting up a fight,
So the world can see –
That I’m not just one side
I’m 3D.

Those are good!

If I were to make suggestions I'd remove the last line of the first poem. I think that the subject of the poem has already been described vividly with your other images, so the use of the ghost image in the last line seems just one too many.

I guess my test is to see if the poem works perfectly well without something then it is better to leave it out. There are probably millions of poets who would tell you the opposite, but when I wrote this year's Halloween one I cut out several verses when it was finished because I didn't think that they added anything to the story or atmosphere.

Similarly, with the second poem I would cut everything before the line 'I always knew that no matter'. From that point on it's very cool, but the early part of the poem uses imagery that is too commonly used to really convey powerfully focussed images any more.

This is entirely personal opinion, and other people may say completely differently, but I hope it's of some help!

hey great poems

you have a creative mind which could also be a part of what is going on in the post in the other forum

you need to be recognised which is a mind wrecking experience when you create something and feel it is wasted as no body hears you, nearly all of the great poets song writers artist composers scientests had depression problems you understand the world in you head but you feel that no body else gets you,

i am writing a book about my life i can email it to you maybe you can see the pit falls and learn.

you should write down all your thoughts silly or profound, store them and every six months revisit them to see what has changed, but keep to a limit of these thoughts distract yourself with something less creative your mind will not get so tired, watch a movie play some sports go for long walks.

I would like to see that book as well, if at all possible - my email is in my profile. For all of the wonderful poems here, I wish I saw more literature. All of the nanowrimo going on makes me genuinely curious to see what genres people are leaning towards, so really, I'd like to see any work of literature anyone in this forum has to offer - everyone is so creative.

And if you're interested in saving yourself the trouble of email, you could post your autobiography into a thread so that everyone could read it.

I once wrote a depressing poem as a joke, that was when I was happy all of the time. Now I feel like utter death. It's crap. I'm thinking of writing serious poems now as I feel the first one is closer to the truth than originally intented.

I'm also going to write a book at some stage, all this is starting early in my life so I'll probably look back and notice it's crap, but aw well. Good way to express what I feel like right now.

Sorry for the lecture about me, anyway, good poems you have there. I look forward to seeing more and I also wouldn't mind a peek at that book as it may help with mine.

The only literature I usually write is either poems or screenplays, which reminds me I need to finish polishing up so I can submit it to a contest at school.

Electric Electic

When I walk
I stumble and grasp onto the nearest
chair, wall, or ceiling
While the world swims in front of me
I shake my head to shake the feeling
Don't cling to me
I'm ecletic and electric
Shock and make jaws drop
brains stop

The room is spinning the music playing
my friends are laughing
they're unaware
that my brain is slipping
my hands are gripping
what feels like soild air.

So yeah. New Poem. I really, really like it. BUT I feel like it needs something else, I just can't put my finger on it. How 'bout y'all?

And here's an old one, just because I feel like sharing it:

The Invisible

All good things must end they say
But it’s never been worth being able to tell
Just when your time is up

I’m tired of the nights of lying in bed
Staring at the shadows on my ceiling
And just wondering what could have been different
What should have been different.

Is there much more to life than this?
If not
Then what’s the point of it being so long,
so drawn out?

Living my days on cruise control
I never speed up
I never slow down
I never remember

It’s better if I just don’t think about anything
About life
And me
About you

You.

Do you remember that night
When I was going to hell?
My faith was never strong
Or maybe never there at all
But how can God judge the invisible?

You never answered me.
I’m a lost cause just like the rest
You didn’t bring it, so what can you do?

Hey hey hey. There is something going on in these poems and I like what is going on. What you might want to do, though, is straight-up take an ice pick to each one and figure out the singular thought you're expressing, (and while you're at it, hoover up the cliches--your original thoughts are so much more powerful).

You definitely have got the outlines of very interesting concepts, but they seem fuzzy to me. So, for example, in your first poem, the disorientation you evoke is really great. Amp it the hell up. Make it so we have less of an idea of what is going on (eg, you're at a party being drunk/disoriented). Also, consider changing the seventh line. You don't need to say "I'm eclectic"--we can get that from the rest of the poem. Consider just repeating--I think the title was a typo, but I think "I'm electric and electric" is a lot stronger than "I'm eclectic and electric". It's very tasty Alice in Wonderland-y, and I think you could have a good time making it weirder.

Think about maybe changing the second poem into a surreal prose piece. It could be very interesting as a dialogue between two characters.

If you do make changes, I'd be very excited to see them. I like your writing, and I like the idea of it becoming stronger. Keep doing things!

Thanks, Elphaba!
My poetry tends to turn out like my thoughts - random and only slightly connected.

I like the dialouge idea, though. I could have fun with that, I think.

I'm lying against the headboard of my bed, you're sitting at my desk. The music had stopped playing half an hour ago, we were sitting in silence, mixed with throwing our thoughts at each other.

"You know..." I began speaking up again, you jerk your face away from the wall that you had been studying and look me in the eye again.
"They're always saying All good things must come to an end...but..." My voice started to trail off, I wasn't sure what you'd say back. "But I don't think it's worth being able to tell just when...your time is up."

You turn the rest of your body to face me, your hands folded in your lap, your face arranged into its listening position. You don't say anything.

"I'm just tired of laying here" - I gesture around my room - "Thinking about what else I could have done, what I should have done...and how much time I have left to do it. I'm tired of it. I don't want to know."

You still don't speak, you just lean a little bit further foward in your seat, with your chest resting against your hands now. The golden cross necklace falls out of your shirt collar where I make you hide it, and it catches the light, taunting me. My rant continues.

"I mean, what else is there to life? I wake up in the mornings, I eat, I go to school, I buy sh*t, I hear about the economy, and then go back to sleep. And when I grow up, I'll wake up, go to work, vaugely think about helping the economy, and then I'll sleep some more. Is there anything else to this life? I mean, if that's all we ever do, then what's the point of it being so long?"

You take the chance to speak again, you know I'll go on forever if you don't.

"It’s better if I just don’t think about anything...About life... about me...even about you."

That's what I hear you say, what you really say is this:

"I just let God take care of my life, he has a plan, I just have to sit back and let him take the wheel sometimes."

I ignore your ignorance. I'm tired of argueing with you about this, you refuse to listen. Why do I even bother talking to you?

"You...."
I turn onto my side, and prop myself up on my elbow, arrange my features into the most condesending look I can manage."

"Do you remember that night When I was going to hell?"

Your eyebrows raise. Don't pretend like you don't know. I keep on.
"My faith was never strong...
Or maybe never there at all
But how...I mean, really, just tell me if you know, because I'm wondering, I'm really curious here, enlighten me oh great one... how can God judge the invisible?"

"Goodnight"
You get up from the chair, you pick up your jacket from the floor, and you walk out of my house. As you turn to close the door behind you, the light catches your face.
There's still the glitter of my lipgloss there.

But you never answered me. It's okay, I know what you were thinking that night, as you got into your car, as you drove home in the cold and dark, watching snow drift towards your headlights in a hypnotizing rhythm.
You're thinking that I’m a lost cause just like the rest that don't believe, and you didn’t make me this way, so what can you do about it?

I'm sure that night you slept as soundly as ever, you knew you could just sit on your a** the rest of your life, and God would take care of it all for you. And the next day you would call, and pretend like it never happened...and I would pick up the phone, and forgive you in minutes.
You try to convert me a day at a time
and I perfer to disturb the comfortably ignorant one at a time.

Whoo-hah! That is a story! Nice one!

Thanks.

The first one is pretty much me just writing words as they came to me, so it's like a rough draft of a rough draft.

Words are erased too quickly to be seen
Minds slip
And wrist drip
Before even the clever see the light
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
They’ve seen the light
In a bottle or a box
A pill or a capsule
They’ve seen the light, they’ve seen the light.
Mind frames of pictures erased
Like their old words of dark
Their poetry and art
Their scribbles of the mind
They understood
And now, they’re happy
What harm was done?
They’re in the light now
Who needs knowledge,
When you have a smile instead?

So...I had a new ending for the other poem. But I woke up and decided I hated it.
So I'm still working on that one.

:: Great job ::

your writing are very good which influences the hidden and sensitive part of you

best of luck with your other writings

keep on

Thanks.

Wow. Feel kinda bad for bumping this again but I've written something I'm quite happy with, figured I might as well share it.

Keep swinging
Until you can touch the skies
And the stars that reflect
In those knowing eyes

You tell me
Just one more year
And I’ll go with you
I’ll fade away and they’ll never remember
Who we were
Those kids with no faces
Just minds that slip away from time to time

You’re my final crime to commit
A closing act
A failing attempt to have
A reason that calls and keeps me standing
When there are no longer walls
Surrounding and supporting
What’s left of the secrets that dig deeper
Than the scars that still itch from time to time

Let’s catch the wind
And look down at the ant towns
The people scurrying so far below
And at such a distance we won’t be able to hear them
As they scream and shake
As they’re laying awake
wondering

Why?