06-13-2015, 05:48 AM
This is the kind of thing that tells me you'll get there, because it's clear that you want to. Don't worry about "what it is" -- the best poetry defies labels and doesn't fit neatly into a box, unless the box has to be made specially for just that one poem.
We are always told by teachers who love to speak in cliches that poetry is "painting pictures with words" and I really like the fact that you've thrown that back as your opening line. Cliches should always be examined thoroughly and probably should only show up in poems as a mockery, which is what I feel you've done here.
Good sounds in your second and third line, but you lose your rhythm in the fourth, not to mention the fact that "deepest chasms" is a bit overdone by the emo crowd and "the human condition" is a catchphrase for pop psychologists. This line could actually be cut without any damage to the rest of the poem, with a very small alteration to the next to link it up.
One thing that I will suggest is that instead of dragging out the big abstractions (heart, soul, love, spirit etc), you look for a concrete image instead. Here you get away with it only because it's fairly straightforward musings, but there is more to be done with ideas that are fresh and specific to you. That doesn't mean those words are off limits -- just that they close down the thought processes of the reader because they're undemanding, with an arbitrary meaning that allows no room to explore further.
Every poet has to write a few of these sorts of poems -- ars poetica, I suppose -- and I always enjoy reading them, because the more we explore the art itself the better it becomes.
We are always told by teachers who love to speak in cliches that poetry is "painting pictures with words" and I really like the fact that you've thrown that back as your opening line. Cliches should always be examined thoroughly and probably should only show up in poems as a mockery, which is what I feel you've done here.
Good sounds in your second and third line, but you lose your rhythm in the fourth, not to mention the fact that "deepest chasms" is a bit overdone by the emo crowd and "the human condition" is a catchphrase for pop psychologists. This line could actually be cut without any damage to the rest of the poem, with a very small alteration to the next to link it up.
One thing that I will suggest is that instead of dragging out the big abstractions (heart, soul, love, spirit etc), you look for a concrete image instead. Here you get away with it only because it's fairly straightforward musings, but there is more to be done with ideas that are fresh and specific to you. That doesn't mean those words are off limits -- just that they close down the thought processes of the reader because they're undemanding, with an arbitrary meaning that allows no room to explore further.
Every poet has to write a few of these sorts of poems -- ars poetica, I suppose -- and I always enjoy reading them, because the more we explore the art itself the better it becomes.
It could be worse