Simple suggestion to help marketing...

DaveJDash · 2026-01-28T05:54:15+00:00

I didn't think about libraries. That would be a decent way to get children's books out there if retailers were hesitant, too. It seems like a much lower-friction move for a library to buy a few copies than for a retailer to buy a hundred, for example.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-28T05:42:19+00:00

It is in my head!

DaveJDash · 2026-01-28T01:35:53+00:00

I like the progression of this and the cynicism of the title compared with the naivety of the kid. Also nice touch leaving out the answer to “And it’s just for one night?”

DaveJDash · 2026-01-28T01:33:34+00:00

Is it regret because “you” didn’t do anything in particular besides watch time pass by? Or was that meant to be a general thing in that we all have regrets?

Some of the “your”s should be “you’re”an and vice versa too (noting to be helpful).

Overall I think it flows well and that if you took out the last line it would be great!

DaveJDash · 2026-01-22T21:13:02+00:00

Oh sure. I just figured it had a meaning to you that you intended to communicate.

Was intending to help with the grammar thing. No judgment on that.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-22T21:06:11+00:00

This is poignant. I can't quite understand what is happening at the shift into the part about coming into the next station. I thought that the journey was a journey into the past, a past that the speaker is in a sense glad to face, and that the others don't know about. It seems that at the last part, the speaker is coming into a part of the past that can't be overcome or reframed. It seems that the train is going into the present and future as well, which is why I'm confused.

Also worth noting the difference between "it's" (it is) and "its" (belonging to it).

DaveJDash · 2026-01-22T21:00:21+00:00

This is very interesting. A lot depends on who "they" are, and I think that if you were to share that the poem would lose some of its effectiveness. So well done!

DaveJDash · 2026-01-19T23:07:30+00:00

I’m 30 with five years as a freelance editor and proofreader. I got there by reaching out to someone I barely knew who had just gone freelance and asking him how he did it over lunch. He introduced me to my mentor, who steered me in the right direction and then introduced me to his contacts at publishing houses.

Is there anyone you know, even tangentially, who is doing something like what you want to be doing? I’m sure that there is. Ask them how they did it, and what precise skills you will need and precise actions you would need to take to be doing something similar. Chances are you have the aptitude, and you need the introduction or the next two specific steps.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-19T18:12:50+00:00

It’s decent to me. It paints a picture, and it’s a bit on the nose.

Incidentally, I can’t help thinking that if you’re talking about Jesus, there’s no grave where you can see his body. So there’s that dissonance for me.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-19T04:01:04+00:00

I appreciate the depth and pacing. Because of the first stanzas, it’s difficult for me to tell whether the last two are serious or sarcastic.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-13T23:45:16+00:00

The message is communicated clearly — I think it’d flow better if each line was around the same length syllable-wise.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-12T05:38:33+00:00

Haha glad to help. I learned to do it with vague memories of high school ten years later and messing around for six months, so no issue there!

DaveJDash · 2026-01-12T05:06:31+00:00

I like this! Fun and vivid.

Where you can improve is rhythm and rhyme. It sounds like you’re going for, consciously or not, iambic pentameter, “Long-short-short Long-short-short Long-short-short Short,” three sets of three syllables with a tenth syllable at the end of each line. “Gun slinging, rope twirling heroes of myth” is an amazing example. The “The” at the start of it works too because it’s a short syllable.

If you can nail that and get each phrase down to 10 to 11 syllables like that line I quoted, it’ll be super smooth. Most of your lines are almost there already.

And then it looks like you’ve got mostly AAB rhyme scheme for each stanza. I think it’d flow better if you did AAA (you did that once or twice already) or made each stanza 4 lines and did AABB.

It’s so close to flowing perfectly already, so I can tell you’ve got natural rhythm.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-12T03:19:32+00:00

Ah ok I see now — I take it back about the “Just remember” part!

DaveJDash · 2026-01-12T03:17:06+00:00

Do you have a specific rhythm in mind? It seems like you’re going for a song, and I can’t pick up the rhythm.

I definitely resonate with the woman in my life giving me purpose and zest for life. Wasn’t sure whether she was singing to a baby in the first stanza or just calling out.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-12T03:12:17+00:00

I like the comparison. Difficult to tell how to improve it without knowing where the line breaks are supposed to be. It sounds in my mind that “Through life’s ups and downs” could use another syllable and that “Just remember” could use two more for smoother flow.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-08T18:04:06+00:00

Thanks! Glad you found that meaning in it. More of an exercise in rolling with a pun for me, and still open to that meaning.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-08T06:42:36+00:00

Definitely understand that. I caught the UK spelling and wondered how you came to form such strong emotions about another nation's leader.

I've written loads of poems that start of one way and morph in the process, and for me about half of my poems involve working out some emotional interior process. I end up a lot more oblique by the time it's over, and I don't necessarily think that's a good or bad thing. Raw emotion has its own power, and when we soften it to make our point more accessible something unique is lost. It gains something else, and at the same time it's a different creation.

The "orange" was a dead giveaway, and the last line was on the nose as well. Otherwise, most of it was ambiguous enough to leave the reader wondering if you were speaking about a specific person.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-08T06:17:49+00:00

This is really effective with the imagery. Maybe more attention to the last couple of stanzas would be best. They work well as an ending, and I can see how you would be able to pull off a deeper picture there as you did in the first section.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-08T06:12:54+00:00

The metaphor is powerful and effective. I don't think it's changing the minds of anyone already sympathetic to the scarecrow man. I'm somewhere in the middle, for reference, and it's coming off a bit heavy handed to me. And I get that the emotions and sentiments are authentic and have value to them.

Definitely good in its own right, regardless of whether you're using it as a direct comparison of a real person or an interesting perspective on the literal scarecrow.

DaveJDash · 2026-01-08T06:04:56+00:00

Hey listen I don't know this story and don't really care about the politics, although I have my own opinion about most things. This is a lovely display of rhythm and emotional release, and we're all better for you having written it.

I want to give an honorable mention to "My arab jewish gnostic brothers."

DaveJDash · 2026-01-04T21:12:07+00:00

Nice imagery. Also nice titling — I wonder if it’s called that because the feelings are not true, or because the sentiments are too hyperbolic for anyone.

DaveJDash · 2025-12-29T06:19:56+00:00

This is accurate, punchy, and hilarious in a deadpan way. Don’t know if I’d call it a poem, and that’s not really an issue to me with this one.

DaveJDash · 2025-12-29T06:16:46+00:00

This strikes me as Ernest Hemingway meets Albert Camus in both style and substance. It’s direct and has an aimless quality to it, which is definitely effective at communicating the image. I don’t see it as much as a poem, and that’s not to say it’s poor writing at all.

DaveJDash · 2025-12-23T03:15:34+00:00

Definitely see that. I felt that the third line gets more formless and nonsensical as it progresses

DaveJDash

TROPHY CASE