New Poem

[Kitsune]

And I could use a bit of help with it guys... I've gone back to it twice over the past 6 six months, and I just keep thinking that as it is, with no real structure, that it's not a real poem...

I'd love your critique's on this... Oh, it's currently unnamed...

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Our Souls flit along,
Like a snowflake on the breeze.
Carried by joy,
We create our matrix.

Mimicking all we see,
Yet different to the core.
I sometime's wonder,
As I watch them drift.

Can a snowflake can see the others?
Can it feel their presence
Bringing peace with the sense?
Or does it feel alone.

Unloved in an apathetic universe
As it falls to rest
Upon the lifeless bodies
Of all it's kindred?

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So, whatcha think?

[runewulf]

provocative... I would like to see what happens if you can find that mind space and expand a few more verses, but it is evocative.

[Max]

It's beautiful, I don't know if I'd want you to change anything!

You could possibly play with the punctuation, read it out loud and see where you want pauses, or if you want the lines to run. One thing - don't slap me I'm a grammar nerd - probably typos but no apostrophe on 'sometimes' or 'its'...

And Kitsune, of course it's a proper poem. In the poem you have the story of "our", and the story of the "snowflake"s descent, and then you link the ideas together in the last stanza. Of course I'm horridly shortening the meaning and not doing it justice but you know what I mean. The poem makes you wonder: who is unloved, the narrator (I mean the poem's voice, not the writer) or the snowflake? Is the "our" of the first line a group/couple of people who know each other (so it's about personal depression), or the general "our" of humanity (narrator is very melancholy and cynical). I like that it makes you think, I like that purposeful vagueness.

Have I got the right idea about the poem?

[Kitsune]

Thank you Max, I'm really glad you enjoyed it.

I couldn't say if you got it "right"... I consider the fact that you took anything from my babbling to be a good thing.

I remember that I got the idea as my husband and I were driving home one night in December (maybe early January) and I saw a few lone snowflakes fall. And the words just bubbled up. I was in a very melancholy and cynical at the time, so you did get that right.

And the grammar is mostly just silly mistakes. My teachers were never very clear on which goes where, and if I'm not paying attention I tend to put them everywhere.

It's a bad habit I've been trying to stop for a while now.

I originally had it in just two parts, and I think it carried the story better, but the problem was that I ended up having 9 lines in the first set and only 7 in the second. Anyways, I figure one day I'll figure out exactly how to figure it out... I am really glad that you liked the it. The imagry evoked, for me at least, is very powerful, and I love seeing what I get afterward.

Thank you for your comments.

[forgotten oceans]

Nothing to add really, but I like it. It's all winter blues-ish. I just like it. Like hot chocolate and soft scarves like it. Good job!! =D>

[Max]

Oh I see what you mean about separating the lines into stanzas. It doesn't have to have a regular scheme, it's much more common for poetry to be free verse these days anyway, at least in my world. Here's a suggestion, just moving it around for fun, how about three stanzas of 6, 5, 5? (Poetry is so much fun to play with ) What do you think?

Our Souls flit along,
Like a snowflake on the breeze.
Carried by joy,
We create our matrix.
Mimicking all we see,
Yet different to the core.

I sometimes wonder,
As I watch them drift.
Can a snowflake can see the others?
Can it feel their presence
Bringing peace with the sense?

Or does it feel alone.
Unloved in an apathetic universe
As it falls to rest
Upon the lifeless bodies
Of all its kindred?

[Kitsune]

Man, next time I need some poetry edited and worked on, I'm coming to you Max. I always thought stanzas had to be the same length.

I'm really glad you all like it. Maybe one day, when I have learned how to play the harp, I'll put it to music. By then I may have enough poetry to do an album.

[white_harmony]

Goodness no, stanzas don't have to be the same length. As long as they flit along and flow just fine, then don't worry about the length of the stanzas. Play with it next time some new poetry comes along, and you'll find they flow much better when you don't worry about stanza length and just write it as it feels best

[Kitsune]

What can I say... My teachers always said the best poems were the ones that were either all one stanza, or where the stanzas were the same length. That any where it didn't match weren't "real" poetry, it was an amateurs work, and could be make so much better if the writer followed the rules more.

Maybe that's the reason I don't write much poetry... I've always thought that I had to follow the rules, and it made writing that much harder for me.

[Kystar]

That's funny, Kistune, b/c my Literature teacher always said that prose has rule where poetry doesn't!

There IS a school of thought out that that if you don't match the pentameter of Shakespeare, you're not writing proper poetry, but it's not often considered a popular opinion.

There are styles out there that follow certain rules for poetry, but not everything can be classified by those rules. And I don't remember them, so don't ask.

I agree that the meter is important for some poetry...after all, Poe's most powerful and moving poems have a meter to them. The Raven, The Bells, and the Conqueror Worm come to mind.

I was taught not everything has to rhyme and not everything has to have a symmetrical rhythm. Some poems are more powerful because of the LACK of symmetry.