Second Edit: Growth

[Richard]

Second Edit:

Growth

I miss the nothing days of my youth
when worry was a seed,
two stomachs rubbed
together like mittens,
white with the year’s first snow.
Tears hid amongst rain in June,
puddles deeper than before.
Our unsaid words still colourful leaves,
your silence not yet a barren tree.
I miss the nothing days of our youth.

First Edit:

Growth

I miss the nothing days of my youth
when our worry was a seed.
Our stomachs rubbed together like two mittens
dirty with the year’s first snow.
Our tears were rain in June;
puddles that would always dry up.
Your silence was not yet a barren tree.
But your colourful leaves would become
words lost,
broken shade all-encompassing.
I miss the nothing days of our youth.


Original:

Growth

I miss the nothing days of my youth,
when our worry was a seed.
Our stomachs rubbed together
like two mittens
dirty with the year's first snow.
Our tears rain in June;
puddles that would always dry up.
Your silence wasn't a barren tree,
colourful leaves words lost,
broken shade all encompassing.
I miss the nothing days of our youth.

[dukealien]

Growth

I miss the nothing days of my youth, nice rhythm on this line
when our worry was a seed. lovely ambiguity - was it a seed of later worry, or was a seed what we worried about?
Our stomachs rubbed together
like two mittens nice simile, also suggests protective covering...
dirty with the year's first snow. for some reason this just keeps getting more suggestive
Our tears rain in June; this line doesn't work for me - if "rain" is a verb it should be past tense, if absent "were" is assumed the rhythm is choppy
puddles that would always dry up. back to suggestive
Your silence wasn't a barren tree, I itch to make this "Your silence was no barren tree" for flow, but that would be too poetistic for the rest of the work
colourful leaves words lost, nice metaphor but difficult to read aloud
broken shade all encompassing.  hyphen or en-dash:  "all-encompassing," otherwise a rough inversion here
I miss the nothing days of our youth.  Subtle - the reader will glance up to the first line and confirm that the growth is from all-about-me to need and affection

In mild to moderate critique, the above should not be taken too much to heart:  it's a good concept with good images, metaphors, similes.  I point out roughnesses in places, but smoothing them out too much would be at the expense of authenticity.

The suggestiveness may be just in my dirty-old-man mind.  Or not   .

Quite enjoyable - thanks for posting this.

[Richard]

Hey Duke,
Thanks for the feedback. I was a bit worried if the first and last line worked, so I'm happy to read what you had to say about them. There is definitely a certain level of suggestiveness intended, so no worries on that front.

I really appreciate some of your suggests about the rhythm, and I plan on using some of them in the first edit.

Thanks again,
Richard

[Youi]

Growth

I miss the nothing days of my youth, I felt like saying "I miss my youth and its nothing days" sounded better. The first line was a little melodramatic, and probably because of the phrasing.
when our worry was a seed.
Our stomachs rubbed together
like two mittens I can't reason out why this line is broken this way, other than to accentuate the unexpected visual of mittens. And for the record, I like the unexpectedness. The line break is distracting me, though.
dirty with the year's first snow.
Our tears rain in June;
puddles that would always dry up.This is an incomplete sentence. I'm aggravated by it.
Your silence wasn't a barren tree,
colourful leaves words lost,
broken shade all encompassing. 

These last three thoughts do well sounding like you reminisce on days of the past. They are still incomplete sentences that are aggravating me.

I miss the nothing days of our youth. The subtle change in tone is fantastic. The replacement of the one word turns the nostalgia into remorse, and its subtlety is powerful.

[Richard]

Hey Youi,
Thanks for the feedback. There is an edit of this in the works.

Thanks again,
Richard

---

Hey all,
I got some ideas rereading this tonight, so I edited this one rather quickly. Feel free to let me know if it's an improvement.

Thanks in advance,
Richard

[Yjack123]

Yeah, overall I liked this. You have obviously put a lot of work into it. Smooth flow.
Not in love with "all encompassing" but I think the rest is fairly well polished. A bit of the prose. It won't change the world, but it's nicely done.

[Wastrel]

Hi Duke, just thought I'd pass on that I read the first edit before reading the original
and the line that stood out (in a good way) was "your silence was not yet a barren tree".
I then read the line in the original. The edit lifts it to another level.

I stumbled a bit on: "broken shade all-encompassing". A suggestion is to maybe put
a comma after shade and ditch the hyphen, or: all-encompassing broken shade".

[Richard]

Hey Wastrel and Yjack123,
Thanks for the feedback. I feel like this one is getting close to being where I want it to be.

Thanks again,
Richard

[Knot]

Hi Richard,
lots to like here.


I miss the nothing days of my youth
Like the opening, though not that keen on the repeated
θ sound in noTHing and youTH (though this could just be my accent).
I do think 'of my youth' (why not 'our'?) weakens the line
('mittens' and 'tears in June' imply youth).

when our worry was a seed.
nice image, do you need 'our'?

Our stomachs rubbed together like two mittens
'our' again. But another good image.
Though you could perhaps break the line after rubbed.

dirty with the year’s first snow.
Our tears were rain in June;
puddles that would always dry up.
not sure what 'puddles' adds here.
'tears/June' seem slightly forced after 'mittens'.
I'd suggest breaking the piece up into smaller segments,
rather than one big chunk, it might help give a greater
sense of movement.

Your silence was not yet a barren tree.
Really good line.
I'd be tempted to cut the lines about leaves altogether,
I think they just dilute this one.

But your colourful leaves would become
words lost,
broken shade all-encompassing.
For me, this doesn't work after 'barren tree'.
Should it not read as;
your colourful leaves
not yet lost
your broken shade
still all-encompassing ?
'Colourful' after the earlies strong images, comes across as rather weak, I think.
Can't quite get 'broken shade' I'm afraid. If it's broken how is it 'all-encompassing'?

I miss the nothing days of our youth.
Don't quite buy the repetition.
It seemed like you were leading up to saying
what it was that changed the 'nothing' to something.
If one seed became a tree, what did N's become? Regret?

Best, Knot.

[Richard]

Hey Knot,
Thanks for the feedback. I haven't thought about this one in a couple of weeks, so it's interesting to look at again. You definitely gave me ideas for moving forward with this piece.

Thanks again,
Richard

[Lizzie]

First Edit:

Growth

I miss the nothing days of my youth -- I like this phrasing, portraying "nothing" as a good thing
when our worry was a seed.
Our stomachs rubbed together like two mittens
dirty with the year’s first snow. -- "dirty" doesn't seem to fit here since there seems to be a purity to the "nothing" times
Our tears were rain in June;
puddles that would always dry up. -- I'd think of a more compelling way to say 'dry up.' There are so many more interesting verbs. At least, I don't think you need, "up."
Your silence was not yet a barren tree. -- I don't like the being verb of "was." It forces you to contort the sentence with "not yet," which reads awkwardly and necessitates more words than necessary. I'd try to re-state this line with a verb that contains more spark, more action. You could say something about the silence being bountiful, which would be a nice contrast and rephrase the sentence so you don't have to use the "not yet." You could do this by using the opposite of "barren" since it might be easier to find a dynamic verb in that construction.
But your colourful leaves would become -- why "would become" instead of just became?
words lost,
broken shade all-encompassing.
I miss the nothing days of our youth. -- I like how this "bookends" the main concept. After all the winding roads the poem has led us on, this brings us back to the theme. I also like that it's slightly different, accenting "our" instead of "my" to say much about how life has changed in very little space.

Lots to like here, imagery wise. But, I particularly like the contrast between the comfortable, pristine silence of the young years, like a new snow, and the strained/unsatisfying silence of later years. This is a "fruitful" concept.


Anyway, all the best to you in your writing.

Lizzie

[Richard]

Hey Lizzie,
Thanks for the feedback. As always, some of your comments gave me some much needed direction with where to go with the next edit. I was actually stuck for a bit on this today until reading some of your thoughts.

Thanks again,
Richard

---

Hey all,
I decided to play around with the wording and some of the images here. Feel free to let me know if it's an improvement or not.

Thanks in advance,
Richard

[Todd]

Hi Richard,

I missed this one when you first posted and I've come to this late. Here are some comments on your latest revision.

Second Edit:

Growth--I like the title. It uses the metaphor of growing up as a construct for growing apart.

I miss the nothing days of my youth--solid first line. It speaks to the element of childhood that was uncomplicated with tons of stretched out days.
when worry was a seed,--This is a nice adjustment first for the better sonics (two w words) and then because it doesn't introduce the our of the poem to early. I love the content of this line. The child, or the person new to the relationship doesn't have worries yet, but the seeds get planted. This is one of the best ideas in the poem.
two stomachs rubbed --I am interpreting this line sexually. I can't actually see an early childhood comparison to attach to it. This isn't a problem necessarily, but if you could solve it the poem might be stronger. I take this as the idea of exploration where everything is new for the couple. From how I'm reading this, I see how it's sort of close to childhood exploration but for me it's still a slight miss.
together like mittens,--Nice snap back to childhood.
white with the year’s first snow.--okay so white is to give me purity and innocence. It works. Alternatively, though you could start with the tears/puddles/sorrow theme a little earlier plant a seed so to speak. You could also engage another sense if you wanted to. Something like "damp" perhaps instead of white. It's your theme though just wanted to put that out there.
Tears hid amongst rain in June,--I get that we're moving threw the seasons Spring above, Summer here, Autum two lines down and finally winter. If you really want to do that maybe incorporate that sort of theme into your title somehow. In June is the weakest of these seasonal markers. I'd try for an image instead.
puddles deeper than before.
Our unsaid words still colourful leaves,
your silence not yet a barren tree.--I do like these two lines and images.
I miss the nothing days of our youth.--I see the our here but the repetition just isn't working for me as a close. I think if you're going to go with the seasons than possible stop the poem on barren tree. 

Just some thoughts for you. There's a lot here I like.

Best,

Todd

[Knot]

Hi Richard,

strengthened by the revision, I think.
Just a couple of small suggestions;
'lost' for 'hid'
(Is there a way to improve on 'rain', not 'storm' but similar?)
'pools' for puddles'

Best, Knot.

[Richard]

Hey Todd and Knot,
Thanks for the feedback. This one is a bit strange because some of it seems to be working the way I want it to, while other parts are taking longer to come together. May be I'm just rambling... I hope what I said there makes sense.

Thanks again,
Richard