A Wretched Crusade

Desolation’s cloak now enthroned
Sanctifying the enduring mist
Of mislead manners’ gist
Enervating comprehension
For a mind distantly corrupt

An introvert for self’s spark
Brilliance to rot in the dark
An extrovert to any mark
Of self denial and lark

Crusading hope within
Deviating sanity to sin
Dismantling heart from kin
Severing the soul from flesh and skin
 
Shackled in doom and despair
Plunged to the core of a nightmare
 Far too broken to share
Any symptoms of concern and care

A better man to walk again
Out from this torment and strain
Bearing nothing but this bane
And the promise of one final gain
This self to be once again sane

Reviews

[Jeannie Wilder]

I agree with Bette. And for me, it is because the first stanza you have two lines that don't rhyme with any of it, and you don't use the same rhyme for the entire stanza, where the rest of them do. I feel like you were finding words that rhymed and trying to make them fit for the piece. Kind of like when you are working on a puzzle, and there's a piece that's close but not quite the same shape... but you try to make it fit regardless.
This was most evident in:
"by hindrance and disrupt"
disrupt really doesn't fit there... it's not quite the right tense, or form or something. And I realize sometimes poets do that, but it doesn't work here for me.
I would look the piece over again, and see if it's really what you want, don't be afraid to change it.

[Bette]

your rhyme is great but i felt a little forced to me.
(i have had people tell me that too!)