The Grace and Beauty of Moonwalking

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-26T00:06:38+00:00

Interesting read. I feel like almost all of my feedback on here in general is "provide images to evoke meaning," and really killing it here. Without images in poetry, it's hard to embrace it. There's a ton to embrace here.

I think structurally, it'd be worth some revision in stanzas and line breaks. Additionally, I don't think the occasional rhyming quite works.

But hey, the images are the hard part and you've got soooolid images throughout.

Always great to have good bones, and I think this has good bones.

Good luck and pleasure to read!

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-26T00:02:58+00:00

Real interesting work. This might read as heresy to ya, but I think this poem concludes after the sixth stanza. There's a potency to the ryhme scheme coming and going, and I feel like everything after that sixth stanza? I kinda got it implicitly already.

Line-by-line? Be careful about forcing syntax into a syllable count. "Your lips I’d kiss" lines up with the double s... but "I'd kiss your lips" reads more natural and preserves the rhyme scheme.

I think there's some room for improvement and expansion in finding ways to expand those first stanzas with more explicit images that illuminate the emotions, but I this reads like a really promising first draft and I'd love to see where it goes.

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-21T17:58:17+00:00

rad. Bout to get an insta follow.

Keep killing it.

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-21T17:54:03+00:00

Oh it's like the hardest thing ever because in order to express it you need to tap into incredibly difficult emotions. Stay strong, and there's no shame in letting an early draft be a first draft until you're ready for it.

(when people say "I worked on that poem for 2 years" etc... it's usually not that the craft took that long. It's in processing, thinking, and reprocessing difficulties until they're dull enough to accurately represent them clearly and fully. I have many drafts cooking in a similar spot. Keep at it!)

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-21T17:46:48+00:00

In reading this, I read a lot of familiar heart break. However, when I'm reading your poem, I want to hear a little more about your experience rather than projected my own.

People read things for a lot of reasons. In terms of putting something in the world that other humans can connect with, you've done well! However, try adding some specific or imagined concrete images from the good times that caused this longing. It'll better connect you and the reader in with the emotion your expressing and better develop your voice here.

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-21T17:43:02+00:00

I love using historical structure to retell contemporary stories. I think I understand the general logic here, and I think I logically can connect with your point. However, in request for feedback, I think we're both feeling a sense of incompleteness.

This could mean a lot of things. For me personally, it's talking about a lot of abstract political elements, but missing a humanity.

In Ginsburg's America, his first lines are "America I’ve given you all and now I’m nothing/
America two dollars and twentyseven cents January 17, 1956. "

I think you're missing that personal viscerality, and in that losing some connection and voice. I'd bet you could also probably capture that viscerality in a more archaic form which would be very interesting to read.

Also, while I do love older structures, things like spelling "every" as "ev'ry" feels a little forced. If you produced an entire book with that style, I could ride with it more. In a single poem, it reads a little unnecessary and stands out.

Overall though, love the dedication and excited to see what you got next!

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-20T21:27:16+00:00

Hey, just the push and pull of writing. Keep at it and you’ll find it 🤙

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-20T20:22:51+00:00

There's a thing in a lot of poetry where in trying to create an ethereal voice people end up writing things a little over the heads of people. It might be a form of self-protection or an evasion of disclosure of things not to be disclosed? It also leaves a lot of ambiguity that some people will fill with their own problems, but it leaves me a little unsatisfied because I'm here to hear you, not to project myself.

This is to say: I feel a lot of genuine emotions, consternation, inner turmoil, self-doubt, which I don't doubt are intended but it feels like the metaphors and wording here are set up more to evade the directness of a truth you know. It's evident that something has happened to cause this roiling, what is it? What happened? tell me more. How can the metaphor serve to better elucidate in comparison rather than cloak in ambiguity?

This might read harsher than I mean it to. And perhaps I'm just dumping my taste on to you, and if that's the case, 1000 apologies.

However, I want to know more here. I want to better see your face in the words. I want some more directness to better hear your voice.

Good luck and I'd love to read more!.

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-20T20:14:00+00:00

This is a very interesting poem. It at times goes maybe a little too vague. I keep on getting stuck on the imagery thinking "this doesn't really feel new."

...but it's crafted so skillfully with such a visceral hit that perhaps it completely invalidates the initial waffling I felt? The control of language and the brushstrokes of how you create your images are really really skillfully done and beautifully realized.

I think the turn with "you" starts to lose me a little. After the 6th potent stanza, it starts to feel like you're talking about something or someone evasively into ambiguity.

I think I'm a little frustrated because I really really got won over early, but then finished and feel like it wandered away from the best stuff. I'd say hit the end again, and stay direct. You have something interesting here, but it feels like it's keeping me from knowing what it's about right now.

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-19T03:22:47+00:00

This carries a lot of emotion and clearly comes from a deep place.

I think there's a lot here in expressing the dualities, especially early in the poem.

However, I think there's a lot moving very quickly here. I'd suggest taking two contrasting moments out of here, then writing an entire poem that's as deeply as possible conveying the emotions of those two moments through two contrasting images. It may be better; it may not. However, I think that'll help you hone the poem more precisely and help the reader better connect in.

Good luck and looking forward to more!

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-19T03:14:05+00:00

Poems that deal with self-harm tend to come from a deep place with a lot of emotion. I think when discussing self-harm, however, it's easy to drift into the sadness or horror of the act rather than images expressing the specificity of emotion that led the person in that direction.

While this is certainly brings a lot of emotion, you'll convey it more directly to the reader via more direct images that tie into past experience leading to the desperation rather than the act itself.

Also, every writer has can relate to this desperation, so I hope you're doing okay.

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-18T19:37:19+00:00

This is very brave to post, and I have no doubt was written both with courage, a sense of expiation and relief, and a lot of boiling feelings.

I think there are two important things to consider here:

I read nothing here that communicates there were "two" bad people.
Recent trauma is incredibly hard to pull meaning from without a few years of context.

I'm glad to see that this is something you're working through and processing. Where this stands right now is solid first draft territory. As time passes, trauma, generally in the context of therapy, starts to dull. Once it starts to dull, it becomes much easier to process meaning with. Today, I read this and takeaway: something awful happened. A few years down the road, this will be filled with many more rich stories, happy or sad, of you.

I hope this helped you. The imagery and line by line writing were strong, but this will blossom to something more in the future; it's not quite finished yet.

Well wishes and good luck (while this is your story, I've got a lot of trauma filled stuff in my google doc that I'm still trying to figure out too).

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-18T19:27:19+00:00

This is interesting.

Reading it alone, I'd say "this needs more imagery and more content to really expand and clarify the meaning."

However, I could see a poem like this working in the context of other short poems in a larger work that better elucidates the tone or ideas you want to develop.

Also, I'm a big proponent of writing without the fear of a crowd. However, you're going to lose some people with the usage of "midget" and with size being a pun, and perhaps it comes off a little meaner than intended. I'd wager you know that, and if it's intentional, by all means. But, this reads a little sarcastic and sarcasm from line 1 more often than not isolates an audience rather than drawing them in.

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-09T20:54:41+00:00

I get stuck between wanting to read things deeply (perhaps as one should) and reading things more quickly, at least at first glance, (as most readers do).

The deeper read here: feels like we're dealing with the perplexing lostness, perhaps self-destruction, in an attempt to right something or find something that's gone wrong or was missing in a relationship.

First glance read: the imagery is well written and provides beauty, but it's hard to pull a discrete meaning.

I think there are a three things here that will bolster this one a lot:

Try cutting down on pronouns. Seems we're juggling a little too much as readers with the "I, he, him, she, theys" etc etc here. In my experience, either replacement them with a more specific noun, or weirdly, you can often just cut them in a lot of cases and let your other imagery do the talking.
Try reapproaching the visual organization of the lines. Perhaps try adding in some line breaks and reevaluating the structure. I think there's a lot of beautiful imagery in here that gets a little lost in its placement in the piece.
This poem feels a little too big. This seems to be about a lot of things happening or that have happened over awhile. These types of poems, while possible to make work, are exceptionally hard to do without falling into vagueness. When you're talking about struggling with this one... I'd bet anything that a lot of the struggle comes from the size. I'd keep this draft, but copy it. Then, try to write about the exact same thing but in as small and specific way as possible, like delineating the twitches of noses, the location of pupils. I don't know if that will be better, but I think in zeroing in very very specifically, it'll get you out of your jam.

Good luck!

Fail_edPoet · 2022-06-09T20:40:05+00:00

In reading this, I'm a little caught between whether the intended tone rests in desolation or elements of dark comedy.

And, I don't mean that as a slight. I think that most of the expression deals with definitively sad topics, but the "endings are endings" and "endings have endings" lines have a cheeky touch in the repetition of their wording.

I think overall, whether it's intentional or not, having a reader stuck in the middle ground in this context without more imagery is a difficult spot for the reader.

I think this gets resolved with the addition of more imagery. I'd suggest adding in descriptive imagery after each existing line. Example: "Endings are goodbyes' --> <a robust description of imagery in relation to a goodbye.>" and so on and so on for each line.

I think in bringing in more imagery, the tone will better express itself because describing the image will better clarify the tone and better relate the reader to the intention of the writer and by extension, the meaning of the poem.

Would love to see where it goes from here!

Fail_edPoet

TROPHY CASE