Poetry / Are you happy?

This one doesn’t work for me.

Each line is vague – they fail to conjure up images for me. I receive no pictures, no connections, no images.

L1 what, how, why, when?  You need to place the reader into the scene immediately so they know where you are and where you are taking them.

L2 since you ending L1 with a period this is a new thought – ok… but it starts with So easily – what is so easy?

L4 what foe?  Why is he/she/it a foe?

Break after L4

L5 what do you mean by cloud?

L7 recommend deleting – doesn’t add anything to the piece and actually conflicts with the general feeling I think the poem is supposed to be about.

L8 – L13 cliche – find more original language to express these ideas.

Then we have vague words – words that have no borders – are too broad : nature, danger, foe, choice, situation, accidents, fate, ignorance, lost.

This piece suffers from trying to be simple and specific yet have a broad application.  Such a piece can only work with the people the piece directly evolved from.  From an outside audience – we need more.  We need images and emotions and details.

Good luck.

I like how this piece has such a firm tongue to it. It’s as if you’re blaming someone for something and want them to know exactly how you feel. The piece kind of reminds me of a piece that I wrote years ago when I was angry at my older brother. It reflected all the fights that I had with him (and believe me, they were quite frequent) and how I hoped he was pleased with himself on the inside after all the things he had done to my parents and myself.

Good job though, I liked it.

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February 21, 2007

by Sarah_Sassy

personal info reviewer stats

No. of Reviews	Overall Quality	Comment Followup
288	95.8% (71 votes)	69.5%

Age	Gender	Location	Last Login
26	F	Sacramento, CA	July 21

Thank you for the review! I really get a kick out of your reviews, because there are some of my peices that you really seem to like and identify with and some things that you’re not so fond of… Keep the critiques coming! They are valued… :

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Very cool poem.  I like the way it feels.  Yet, I can’t help but feel it is too ambiguous for me.  The consistency of the stormy nature of the foe, cast off the cloud, live within its chill stuff is great.  But I can’t really put my finger on what the foe is.  Whether it is a person or circumstances working against you.  It is like half of the metaphor is on the page and the other half is hidden for the reader to guess at.  It seems with the ending lines that it was more choices made and circumstances that led to the danger.  I can’t tell at the end, where things stand.  If the ruin has come as it would seem often in the poem with the lines about the heart breaking, the I can’t see you anymore, and the I’m so lost or if you sit on the edge of disaster in danger as is suggested with the first line.  That last question of are you happy makes me wonder if the foe is really the person to whom you speek.  Of course, I am intrigued and enjoy the read, but would like to see you draw out more from this poem.  Perhaps, it is really just going over my head as I read it and read it again.