Poetry Critique Thread, Ill start:

Short excerpt, have this idea of a MC as a vehicle to explore complete disregard for the material truth, focusing only on perception.

It took what feels like a broken rib, but I busted his nose right open and thats what matters. By any objective measure I lost that fight, but they dont know that, Denisse don't know that. After tonight they'll all remember the dark red color of coagulated blood on his v-neck, but my bleeding is merely internal.

For a long time nothing moved. Each time Thom rose to alertness the clouds had shifted into new orientations of stunning radiance until one of these jolts into consciousness found him in total darkness, with only great bands of stars serving as orientation for up and down, until all these dimensions closed again into a single direction pulling him back into feverish dreams.

When he came up this time it was utterly black. A fine rain falling all about him. Rows of sliding clouds blocked every star and he the felt warmth from the corpse had gone and an increasing wind was whipping the shower into a frigid squall that sheared the heat from his body. Thom pulled himself into the car and lay in the back shivering and spastically flicking pieces of glass onto the floor. The pain about his body grew once again and combined with the seeping cold drove him to dig through Aksai's bags, hauling out a bundle of wretched clothes. Setting aside a felt topcoat he pulled a ball of shirts with him out into the rain and draped them over Aksai and the man he had used the knife on, then retrieved the bottle of water, giving no thought to the other corpses. In the car he produced another orange pill and crushed it to a powder on a notebook and attempted taking it up his nose. More than half of the mass mixed with the rain dripping from his face. Frustrated, he lapped this up and swallowed it with water from the bottle, which with a deathly thirst he drank a full half of before the taste became unbearable. Feeling opiate glow return he shredded the cleanest looking shirt he could find and wrapped it tightly in strips around his burning arm, then pushed patches of the material under his shirt around the wound on his chest. Pulling the felt coat around him he stared out the shattered window and knew he had to get as far as possible from the bodies and the car, and knew he had known this for some time but refused to act on it. It seemed that his mind needed time to process what had occurred even if it did not intrude into the realms of his active thinking.

When it stops raining, he thought to himself. He hoped it would not stop raining.

lel
>poetry
sorry bout that

First stanza of a poem I'll continue if you guys think it's got some potential, and probably also if you don't:

Beast on the taiga
who hides in the wind—
with unseen hand
your herd be thinn'd.
What herd be they?
Why, all who tread
Through the beast on the taiga
who gathers the dead.

Should I keep "who gathers the dead," or repeat "who hides in the wind," or something else?

Weary eyes set in stone
A glazed glare on the gallants
One may ask to be or not to be
But imitation is death unto all
The night you follow will be your fall
Yet the shining amour may guide you
To moon and subside you

I'm not a poetry person so I tend to be put off by rhyme schemes, but I found the '-owers' rhyme continuing was refreshing and made up for being a bit put off by 'your youth your youth'. Its not bad necessarily I just think something else would have more impact, especially compared to how righteous and effective the line 'let time not possess those powers' is. I also felt 'Be not shy, and save a sigh' were weak in a similar way, like a strange flagging just before you have your strongest punch come in

sorry, Im not used to critiquing, especially poetry.

this is maybe out of place, but here's a poem that acts as preface for a chapter/session/piece/whatever of my scifi story

2.1: Memories of a Sorcerer, I

‘A becoming animal always involves the pack, a band, the population, a peopling
in short, a multiplicity, the multiplicity
yes a double'
‘ we are not interested in characteristics. That that does interest us, when it does as, of course, and if it does, are expansion, modes thereof,
propagation, occupation'
modes of contagion, people'
‘… not as the chimp at war or the fish adrift alone, but the troop of monkeys, the school of fish,
navigating.'
according to her variable becoming and ephemeral being'
according to her variables, her relations and locations of becoming'
‘… '… to know that he is no longer a definite being distinguished from other beings, nor from all the becoming running through us'
that is'
that nameless white summit,
of Ice, agony and dread.'
the nameless summit of Agony and Death.'
the nameless summit of Agony and Dread'
where dreadwraiths of the ancien regime and their spectres today draw their power'
‘the wolf-Man that bares his teeth at us bearing arms around him,
and the wolves several in number
and the wolves several in number and the forgotten wives indoors.’ [poem]
and the wolves several in number, like so many wives in time, baring theirs at his'
and the forgotten Wives of Time, who bar the shutters, against the winds that are not wind.’ [ballad1, local916.]

[ooc:] ‘… not, pity but unnatural participation, unnatural nuptials against the will of space, the clever wights behind a million suicides, for every star and it again, a trillion homicides, parricides, and copulations and divorcements.
‘[…] any habitual is a necromancy. The habitual gaze is the strongest necromancy. It is the strongest rite, the strictest weapon, it is the Judge and all ten emperors.
And now, at the cold midnight that follows the age of man in the stars, it has achieved
its prescribed destiny and final home in the lunar phases'
access to and control of all moons as gates for the hunt, twice per the course of their respective cycles'
the ensured annihilation of women, human, animal, and all, as well.'

-Super Urizl, the poet-tyrant

frogive me for the deleuze i plan to change it

Hey, I really enjoyed this. I'm not sure how I feel about the parenthesis gimmick but I suppose it was interesting to say the least. The last stanza was definitely the highlight. I'm not a fan, however, of using too much colloquialisms in poetry, maybe that's just me, but I almost cringed at the "GOAT" part. Overall though, I enjoyed.

Reposting this because I have nothing else to contribute (first two poems i've ever written)
Untitled 01
Idle inkling of an issue
Illusory ideals interfering, imagined plights insue
Eyelids shut, I can't deny
immature impulses imbue desire
inexperience impales inside
infected injury, would apologize but can't get past my pride

Dot my I's with icicles
insipid idioms plaguing my tounge to imitate wisdom
irrational nights with tight eyes and internal insecurity
Tell myself that I'll survive, tell myself that tomorrow would be a surprise
Intimate interchange lead to isolation

You left me for an unnamed upstart
Unveiled a euphemism in an attempt to unscrew my heart
But you didn't have to hide, I know I was too preoccupied with I

Untitled 02
predation, malnutrition, disease, suicide, homicide, starvation, dehydration
blood gushing into my lungs, losing my concentration
vision blurry, surrounded by a gun flurry, lying on a street that's in a hurry
coughing up my guts, steel starting to rust, stench commencing to bust

slideshow flashes, of childhood, loved ones, and emotional lashes
reminiscing of shaded trees and exchanged pleasantries
I thought about how I got mad at her for not calling me back
I thought about how my mom never gave me enough slack
I thought about how I spent so much time pretending I don't give a fuck

Ears can't hear, chaos of silver and red splashing the cement canvas
My eyes water at the thought of never again hearing jazz
The back and forth exchanges of curse words and gunshots imatate prose
I'm wondering how the sky can stay so blue above a string of body dominos

I wish I thought of deeper thoughts
I wish I talked to the girl in my lit course
I wish I hadn't went out to eat today
I wish to god that there was a way for me to stay

I WONDER I SWEAR I DO

it was the crack of dawn
eyes adjust, crackling to the sun
this burning inside
this feeling in my gut cant be undone
pain everlasting
a fire that never rests to firm
my uncontrollable hunger
for a blood as sweet and asunder
for a skin as pale my lover
how my heart beats, i wonder

forgive me for what I done
forgive for whatever I havent begun
im not me, im a shell of another
i longed for a day please please bring the rain on the weather
drag the dark on this day
i sank my teeth, ill beg you to stay
please dont be scared of the thunder
please dont be scared of a drum beat on my chest and for whats under
how my heart beats
how my heart beats for you, i wonder

and if my dying day comes
take this wreath for you to remember
even in pain of the world, you were my nurser
how my heart beats, i wonder

Beset by grief and yearning soul,
Winter stripped the leaves from Fall.
Until I heed your beck and call
My eyes a glaze, my heart a hole.
The daily gloom and nightly toll
As sun and moon forever stall.
Each day apart from you, a thrall
Enslavèd by the chunk you stole.
But lovely is the deep expanse,
You've torn across my chest.
Though lovelier you are, my sweet,
As Summer sings a song of chance.
So take from me my honest best.
And grace me with your body's heat

Blue shade has splayed the path
in jagged lightning strokes—
fractured, frozen, broken. . .
shadows moving forward,
absorbing all,
see all
surging with light, with life.
A sweeping wind absorbs
the dandelion orbs,
and then it takes me next.

Still getting there:

It was snowing in summer, I couldn’t believe it:
Seeds like flakes of a flurry,
falling and trickling as sunfish eggs
wafting on a spring-thawed rill.

The easterly ebb of steady zephyrs
mothers for the careless germs
while the prowling kingfisher silently yearns
for updrafts to rest his weary wings

The sub-lime sunlight peeking through the maple leaves
affirms their sinuous meanderings,
Like the careful caress of a distant flame
inspiring a sightless quest.

Cumulonimbus plumes loom along the breeze,
and the westerly horizon, frothing
upon the eddying flow of cirrus wisps
and capturing the rising sun.

To avoid the lightening and thundering rain
I hurriedly march to my nearby car.
I drive straight home and straight inside,
where I pace along my everyday.

Two days passed ‘til I return to wander.
Walking in the rain-soaked woods, I wonder
why I wore nice shoes,
and fear their sheen is something to lose.
Hurrying to flee the waterlogged woods,
imagining of my weathered boots
I fail to see, in my hasty scurry,
skimming over hundreds
of emerging dandelions.

I didn't like it as a poem

I read it again with it in my mind as a narrative delivered by an angry wizard that, say, a goofy black metal song is about and it was much more fitting.

like 'a fire that rests to firm my uncontrollable hunger for a blood as sweet and asunder, for a skin as pale my lover, how my heart beats' at first seemed just sort of sad but self assured, idk how to describe; a pride in a destructive longing, a foolishly cruel optimism, but when it takes on a tone of the inhuman or the supernatural or the anomalously unnatural it sounds like a threat of a nature larger than itll let on, which makes the apology, or request for one, that follows more surprising, but also more touching in a way. idk, im stoned.

also if 'nurser' is deliberate I might be down w that

or not to say it ~is~ sad but self assured sounding, that was just my first impression bc 'this burning inside, this feeling in my gut cant be undone' is v weak and doesn't really convince me of the 'pain everlasting' that is required, for me at least, to really give consideration to the 'fire that never rests to firm' (which is a cool image; a fire that burns forever is nothing special when it comes to imagery/ a symbol imo, but the emphasis here feels like its, unavoidably, on the ambiguous 'rests to firm', the symbol is that which is denied/superseded, or maybe the idea is that which is denigrated/superseded by the symbol. anyway, it made me actively wonder 'what in a fire firms?' and what came to mind was the ash at the bottom of a hearth- which never really firms or becomes firm, it'll always give to touch like dust, but if anything just cooling with the stone it rests on is a type of firming, it carries that notion of lack of heat entailing slowing down, coming together, particle density, etc. whatever- or maybe a hot blade on an anvil, or layers of blown glass, idk, I'll stop now, I'm too many kinds of high desu)

Sorry, I've pretty much just looked semi in depth at one stanza of what I'm not sure yet isn't really a three post piece. I'm not used to critiquing

'forgive me for what I done, forgive for whatever I havent begun' is interesting, especially after the conclusion to the first stanza's transformation (from just being or burning to being aware of that burning's internal origin, and then its productivity), but I mostly just feel confused from there. if anything it seems like I'm trying to find an order to what I perceive as a temporal confusion; what the forest wizard seems to be both apologizing for and warning the audience about (it begins w 'this feeling... can't be undone', or 'i cannot be besides this', or 'this is how things beyond your control are'), but which part of him is he disavowing? Is it the pain everlasting by which he sank his teeth? (is that the 'thunder'?)? or the dragging the dark, the longing for rain that results?

I guess what Im trying to ask is is the pain everlasting the hunger, or the results of it and the inability to deal with them? if that makes sense. I almost had no interest in the ending, but now I'm more intriqued in it as well. The act of giving is the first that doesnt seem to come from suffering, or the suffering from suffering. and the wreath is an interesting choice. Maybe it was what set me on the forest wizard train of thought anyway; I can see my brain seeing 'wreath' and trying to image it and going 'uh, rome? no. pagans? maybe? woods? europe, at least.' etc. until what formed was the singer of Agalloch's voice on Pale Folklore

sorry if thats an awful critique hopefully I'll get more used to it
Im bummed no feedback on this
but also not. Im not v confident in it even though I like it, and I don't wanna start bugging ppl with constant bits of this same world on the reg

OP btw:

Close me up in Pandora's box.
From all the notes of evil and vile.
Behind me the binding locks;
In front the Seraphim's isle.

Wayward day, and thwarted night;
Where dread did once dwell before.
Their forgotten world, where ecstasies light
Can cease from this land, no more.

To scale the wall
Fleeing from Sodom's wrath.
Epiphanies ground to break my fall,
And walk there along sublimities path.

Close me up in Pandora's box.
Where Persephone's splendor envelops me.
Escaping time, where rhythmic chimes
Sing the chorus of infinity.

I feel like I have something to say but I can't articulate it at the moment.

Unrelated to that, why choose to puncuate the first two lines as separate, complete sentences? I think the coolest part of 'Behind me the binding locks; in front the Seraphim's isle' is reading past the resistance i get to not reading each as their own statement, where I might expect it to be 'In front, the Seraphim's isle.' it doesn't happen elsewhere, either

also, 'Epiphanies ground'? as in epiphanies that are the ground which breaks your fall? or that youre landing in ground epiphanies, like some sort of pile of dust. idk if its you're intention at all, but the idea of epiphanies being ground up so as to catch/save/comfort you and then them walking away from you down the old sublimities path is a wonderful image.

I feel like I should get at some question at what it's about, but the Sodom's wrath imagery doesn't interest me enough to make me do that, nor, come to think of it, does the Pandora's box/Persephone etc imagery, but thats probably just prefence.

Shit I keep meaning to just stop, I was considering even posting another piece of my own work, I have papers to work on, but I gotta ask, is it 'dread' that 'their forgotten world' refers to? I'm a big fan of the image of playful ecstasies being trapped/contained by a world that dread has forgotten. and where 'dread did once dwell' can mean anything- it was full of dread, full of dreadful people, etc- to say dread dwelled and then call dread a 'their' is a really neat embodiment of that isnt quite so frequently embodied as death.

although probably 'their' means Seraphim or Pandora and I'm just stupid

Thank you for the generous reply.

About the punctuation, I was probably going to revise it anyway, when I write I usually just put it in as a placeholder until I reach a final decision after thinking about it. But I think you have a good point with those two lines.

Epiphanies ground is meant to be to "catch/save/comfort" but when I said "And walk there along sublimities path" I meant it as entering Pandoras box and waling through it, with Epiphanies kind of intertwined with sublimities, like the sublime is a product of the epiphanies.

when I say "dread did once dwell, I meant that, in the myth all the evils of the world were once contained in pandoras box and dread is kind of just the representative of of all those evils, contrasting it to hope which was kept inside the box. And "their" is referring to dread, and all of the other bad things it represents, and also to kind of personify the evils.

Ignore this-- I noticed a few edits that I missed in the last stanza and a couple punctuation errors

Nice, steady meter that's relaxing to follow. Some abstractions that wouldn't hurt to add more detail, like 'shy'. And some of the lines come off too much as Poetry. (what everyone goes for when first writing poetry)
All in all a nice little poem, but nothing that will stick with me.
7/10

I'll critique more when I have more time.

is there a proper new general critique thread yet? I feel like the old one was done. I've surprisingly been having fun critiquing poetry but y'all need to post more poems for that to work.

There are still a good number of things not critiqued in here, if that's what you're after.

I was just going to say this exact thing

>sage

its a poem of self pity, but a twist of gothic and dark romanticism.

also on a side note, I'm posting a almost vampiric stance on death and pain

Her face I can not conjure,
Yet that voice echoes still:
"This Earth down below shall consume you
For you lack both the wits and the will".
She herself was a dim-looking youngin',
With two fingers and endless contempt.
At the moment the time came unbounded
And no bounds has it found as of yet.

Lathnos het faltern on the high stump
Tious masses rustling their coats in root-eaves below
while Istern hordes trample in a growing spiral
on gods' faces, antipodal.

Sammandrion, sivy settled Satremonger
he may be, lends animate to callowed, mallean Prentics
and holds barred many a mangled law-tracer
but has no heed of his brother

Taphylos, who's none below but the deads' hands
agaze to the primate roil past halted lands.

...

On the sand our sister's standing
Bloody hand and foot, a frantic
harlot's dance, alone and homeless
rancid bones and cooking stones.

red-beaked raptor, sable raven
sullied harbour, unsafe haven
ragged sail, no rest for cravens
stench of rape, revenge, salvation

Father dies and child is born
violent night begets the morn
mem'ry and regret are torn
away, from murder life is made
A whore became a maiden

grrr. I tried to shake up the meter in the end but I think I fucked it up. I need to learn to read before I post.

If it makes you feel any better it bounces all the way up to that last line pretty well. I saw what you were going for; and it does fall a little flat since the rest of the verse is so consistent.
And hell, I purposely write in an out of two to three different meters in some if my works to get some polyrhythms going, and I doubt most anyone who reads them would enjoy em.

Thanks. Can I ask what you thought of other aspects of the poem?

I know it's a bit scummy asking for criticism without giving any but I don't feel qualified and I'm anxious to get an idea of what I'm doing right and wrong. This is my first real try at poetry.

Well, let me just say that I could tell you were a beginner; that you know what you need to know to write it. Now you've got to take on the technical soils as fertilizer and use it to grow your poetry. And, like the sun and water, you need heart and experience to grow what you really want.

But it's still a good attempt. Try using less abractions. You're using imagery, but try it more for the very abstractions you're using. It'll confine you a little, but in the end you'll see it works better. The meter was enjoyable to follow, and as I said, held clearly for the dance, which was entertaining.
6/10

OP that first stanza is really good, keep it up

Thanks user, I appreciate it. Reading over it feels clumsy, I hope that's something that will pass with practice. I was actually trying to use less abstractions but the scene I was attempting to describe is very unrealistic so even describing it faithfully comes across as symbolism. Perhaps I should pay less attention to rhyme and meter before I can accurately portray my message.

No problem.
__________________________

Finished round two of editing.

>Getting There

It was snowing in summer, I couldn’t believe it:
Seeds like flakes of a flurry,
falling and trickling as sunfish eggs
wafting down a spring-thawed rill.

The sub-lime sunlight flowing through the maple leaves
channels their sinuous meanderings.
Like the careful caress of a distant warmth
inspiring a sightless quest.

The easterly ebb of gentle zephyrs
mothers for the careless germs,
while the prowling kingfisher silently yearns
for updrafts to rest his rowing wings.

Cumulonimbus plumes loom along the breeze,
and the westerly horizon; frothing
upon the eddying cirrus wisps,
stead’ly drenching the rising sun.

To avoid the lightening and thundering rain
I hurriedly march to my nearby car.
I drive straight home and straight inside
where I pace along my everyday.

Two days passed ‘til I return to wander.
Walking in the rain-soaked woods, I wonder
why I wore nice shoes,
and fear their sheen is something to lose.
Quick to spring the waterlogged woods,
imagining of my weathered boots,
I fail to see, in my hasty scurry, me
skimming over hundreds
of emerging dandelions.

Ignore this if you wish.

>sage

Tell me that you love me
or-and-because-for-before-after-if I say
I'll kill myself.

How can I speak of mother tongue when it were my fathers words that shaped me?
Not embraced, but scathed and beaten to a pulp, by words so harsh and cold,
they leave me bruised and frozen to this very day.
So now I speak his language,
by extension, live his world,
as he named the colours, the shades of red,
with which I draw my strokes.
Do I hate him?
Yes I do.
Just as he did himself.
Do I love him?
Yes I do.
The only colour of my own.
repost of my shitty poem

not from this thread
but I have a critique of Blake, and it's that it's whacky as shit

'In torment he sunk down & flow'd among her filmy Woof,
His spectre issuing from his feet in flames of fire.'

Sing to us, to the night
Something cute, just like you.
Make me sad, lonely too.
Use your voice, use your might.

Rhyme of peace, not of love.
We're tired, all of us.
We won't yell, won't discuss.
Sing your words, lovely dove.

Ugh.
B8/10

This is okay. But nothing amazing. Make sure you read the basics on writing poetry, and don't just read poetry.
6/10

A lot of abstractions, but I still got the imagery, kind of; and I enjoyed the overall image.
7/10

Id give better critiques, but the 5:1 post and critiquing ratio doesn't really inspire me to.