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It's been a while since I've done poetry.

These are old. We'll see how this goes.


Hell Bent





What Sounds Sweet





Blood Red Sky

Interesting...

I'm somewhat pressed for time at the moment, so I'll have to come back to these in more detail later, but for now I'll give my initial thoughts.

"Hell Bent" has some clever word choices I rather liked, though there's a few places where I'm left wondering if you made a mistake or the unusual syntax is intentional. I can point them when I get back.

"What Sounds Sweet" has a nice rhythm to it. It almost sounds lyrical. Rhyming poetry isn't my personal favorite, but your rhymes didn't sound as forced as so many do, so that's a plus.

"Blood Red Sky" is probably my favorite of these three. I have to admit, the phrase "adorned with thorns" sounds awesome. The imagery overall is kind of in-your-face, but it gives it a certain vibe that I think more or less works.

Thank you. I have a tendency to be abstract and purposeless in my writing. Though meaningless, I tend to excel in imagery and rhythm, and lack structure and overall substance.

I would appreciate specifics; I'm not an experienced writer, I just have my clever moments, so correction would be greatly appreciated.

I would appreciate criticism as well. Much of these poems I don't like. I think why I said my imagery was similar to yours is because your poetry reminded me of the thought processes I used to actually create some of my work, and some of the places their inspiration came from; but in actual comparison, you're a much better writer. My writing is generally erratic and often times incomprehensible, often being the expression of things that are, quite literally, indescribable.

But I suppose I'm over analyzing. I think I prefer your poetry to mine, at least, your writing style.

Out of curiosity, how long have you been writing poetry for? And is that all you write? I kind of flutter between poetry and fiction myself, usual focusing on one more than the other.

Since you're interested in criticism... well, for thing, there's always the difficulty of hedging that line between imagery that's powerful and dramatic, and imagery that falls closer to cliche. For instance, the last two lines of Hell Bent are hedging the edge of affected and tired (in my opinion) while some other lines in there (especially "Time turned priceless by extinction") that sound much more clever and inspired in comparison.

What Sounds Sweet works better I think, because the writing style is a bit more abstract, and there's overall a more contemplative feel to it that invites analysis.

Blood Red Sky, again you have to worry about imagery in a piece like this. And again, I think it's hit and miss throughout. You might try toying with the concepts you're using a little, making their references a bit more tangential and less direct, if that makes sense. You don't want to give the impression you're trying too hard to force and atmosphere, so sometimes less is more, though figuring *that* balance out is probably one of the hardest things in writing poetry, and I certainly don't claim to be a master of it.

So, did you have any more you were thinking of posting? I'd be more than willing to read more.

I have a collection of about 80 some odd poems, I would be happy to post more. I just wanted to hear what you thought of these first.

Here are a couple:




Words Don't Hurt





Soulless Wayfarer





Piss

And answering your questions, I've been writing poetry for 3 years, mostly during my stay in England and travels throughout Europe and Africa. I too switch between writing poetry and fictional short stories, mostly philosophical science fiction, and have been working on a series of character based novel's for 10 years, none of which are published, none of which are finished.

I rather like Words "Don't Hurt", the concept and imagery both seem fairly unique, though the last line feels a little weak to me.

"Soulless Wayfarer" feels... long, which is kind of cool, because I think that fits the nature of the poem. I like when the form interacts with the content.

"Piss" feels a bit ranty, like it doesn't quite bridge the gap between personal struggle and evoking empathy in the reader. Still, it has a fairly strong rhythm, and feels focused at the least.

I'm not sure how to fix the ending of "Words Don't Hurt", though I agree with you. I'm not really sure how to describe the end result of being truly wounded by words.

"Soulless Wayfarer" is the only poem I ever wrote about someone specifically, in fact, I really have no idea what is says. That ones a drunkin brawl of a poem. A can of worms unimportant enough to me not to open again.

"Piss" was a genuinely bad day. Nothing more. The apathy stems from that sentiment.

Oh, I meant to ask, you're obviously a fan of the block structure, do you ever try working in stanzas?

Here are three more. All of these poems, including the previously posted, are old. I haven't written poetry in more than a year.



My Arsis





In the end of things...






A demons frown...

I have. I don't often; for some reason block style is how my mind works. When I do stanza's its generally completed thoughts. Most of these posts were incomplete and unexpressed at the time of their writing. Writing for me is an emotional process of expression. It's this or martial arts, which lately, has been martial arts. So writing for is generally genuinely inspirational, and rarely is it disciplined, not unlike my lifestyle.

Interesting observation.

"My Arsis" has some really evocative imagery, I particularly like the first 5 or 6 lines.

I like "In the end of things..." as well, except for the third repetition which, to me, doesn't seem to quite fit with the rest of the poem, possibly because of the longer lines.

"A demons frown..." is kind of interesting depending on the reading; I'm not taking it literally, since the basic imagery seems kind of simplistic, so I'm assuming it's metaphor. Not quite sure on the quote at the end, it doesn't seem to really fit there, and the repetition of "damned" comes off as awkward to me.

And, at your last post, I see. That makes sense, I think, and I have to say, for being an emotional poet, your stuff is a lot more accessible than a lot of such work I've read. You manage to make things seem broader than yourself fairly well, I think.

Well, that's because I'm broad. It's more an attempt at ambiguity than it is clever.

Interesting comments though.

"My Arsis" does it's job.

"In the end of things..." the third repetition has some very weak lines. I agree. Especially the burning birth control one. (was rather funny in my mind)

"A demons frown..." reminds me of a poem I wrote that I can't seem to locate, which is a shame. This one is metaphorical for the vices I've suffered during my travels and the redeeming qualities of my past experiences in comparison. The one I'm trying to locate uses stronger imagery to describe a similar inspiration. This one I wrote in Egypt, I'm trying to find my poem from Sudan.

FOUND IT. YES. It's not very good. No where near as good as I remembered. Oh well.


We




And with that, I'll be back later.

I do prefer that one, the imagery seems to resonate more powerfully and I overall like the flow of it better.

I notice you're rather fond of the word ashes. :p I think every poet has words like that that show up over and over again in their work. (Not sure I can get through a poem, myself, without using the word "God" in some fashion...) It's interesting too juxtapose the different usages, I find.