The One Who Holds me

Its too hard to let go

He sat there, I saw him from far away

His big beautiful eyes, The safety I felt

He was Home, a feeling I had never felt

Then the storm began, and I was lost

His words roared like the thunder,

His love was as dry as the desert, for some reason I still loved him

I reach for him, I scream, I yell

Any ounce of his love would help

The love he has for me 

I didn't understand the pain I felt,

"I do apologize, my dear lover" I say before his hands bounce off me like rain drops dancing in a puddle

I pleaded with him to stop but his love was too strong,

I sat in the mirror, looking at the dark rings that consumed my arms

So this is it? This is my love

Scared to leave, scared to stay

I cried and I prayed 

Oh dear lover, love me again

I knew this was something he was incapable of doing. 

Distant we grew, it still hurts

For he was my water, and I was a visitor in his desert 

The storm had just began

Reviews

[JayG]

• i want to make money for my parents so hopefully this goes somewhere

I praise your dedication, and applaud your goal. But I also have bad news.

First, almost no one makes money from poetry these days. And those who do have studied hard, over time measured in years.

Added to that, are you dying to know my feelings? Of course not. You know nothing about me, my history, my situation, or anything that would make you care about me in any way. Are you any different, as others see you? Are there people burning to know what’s on your mind? Naaa…

In any case, poetry isn’t people talking about yourselves. People read poetry to have it make them feel, and care. They seek an emotional experience—to have you make them feel and care.

We don’t tell the reader that we wept at the funeral, for example, we work to give the reader a reason to weep. And in all the years of your schooling, did even one teacher, talk about how to do that? No, because their goal is to make you ready for the needs of employment. And since employers need us to mostly write reports, papers, and letters, that’s what they assign us to write.

Did a single teacher talk about prosody? It's critical to poetry, but why would they? Only poets and fiction writers need to know what it is and how to make it work for you. How about using stanzas—a poetic form of paragraphing? No again, right?

So…the bad news is that you’re not going to be rich and famous this year for your writing. The good news is that there’s no reason you can’t learn the necessary skills. And since you already want to write poetry, the learning will be a lot like going backstage at the professional theater for the first time. And since no one else in your school knows what you just learned, you’ll probably end up the best poet in the school. So what’s not to love?

So, some suggestions:

First, read the excerpt to Stephen Fry’s, The Ode Less traveled, on Amazon. He’s focused on structured poetry, but what he has to say about the flow of language is important, and really interesting.

Then, visit the Shmoop site. It’s useful for lots of subjects. But in this case, when you get there, select student. Then use the button next to the mid-page search window to select Poetry. They have lots of great poems there, analyzed deeply, to show what worked and why.

One off-the-subject of poetry thing I do have to say: Your line, “But his love was too strong,” is WAY off. Love had nothing to do with it. We call that assault, and if taken further, rape. And people like that belong in jail, because if not slapped down early, he’ll just do it again to someone else, and someone else. If you ever find yourself in that position again, grab the man's little finger and fold it backwards till it rests again the back of his hand. Screaming in pain tends to slow them down, and, distract them. And if it’s not enough, he has two little fingers, so…

Hang in there, and keep on writing.

Jay Greenstein
https://jaygreenstein.wordpress.com/category/the-craft-of-writing/the-grumpy-old-writing-coach/