Alive Again

[Masterisall]

Alive Again

You pick up the shovel that I hold
-In both of our hands we are digging together
So slowly, the wind taps across our arms
As I help you guide the shovel into the ground
Amazingly
It slips right in
The sod that was in the way is nearly widthless
An effortly moan escapes our lips
This is our first time
We are new to this
Digging a hole, our minds in sync
Deeper into the ground we sink
And the velvet dirt makes contact with the shovel head
This is my grave, and I've just died
But I've been revived just now
Holding on, hand in hand
Digging this hole, has made me love again​

I honestly think this is not very good, and I'm wondering if any of you have any suggestions to make it better.

 

[Angeline]

Alive Again

You pick up the shovel that I hold
-In both of our hands we are digging together
So slowly, the wind taps across our arms
As I help you guide the shovel into the ground
Amazingly
It slips right in
The sod that was in the way is nearly widthless
An effortly moan escapes our lips
This is our first time
We are new to this
Digging a hole, our minds in sync
Deeper into the ground we sink
And the velvet dirt makes contact with the shovel head
This is my grave, and I've just died
But I've been revived just now
Holding on, hand in hand
Digging this hole, has made me love again​

I honestly think this is not very good, and I'm wondering if any of you have any suggestions to make it better.

Hello.

I've seen your name here or maybe read your poems here. When I read this one, the first thing I think is "what is this poem really about?" Is it about a couple digging a hole somewhere? A cemetery? Is the man dead and reborn or having some afterlife experience? And there's a sexual subtext, too, but I don't really get what it all means.

To me, there's too much vagary here to get a clear statement other than that two people are digging a hole and this allows the man to love again. I think if you want to work with the image of a graveyard as a metaphor for death and rebirth or redemption, (physical or metaphysical), it works better to sound authentic. So maybe if there was more information about the place and the two people, strong visual words to help the reader imagine and see it, feel it, etc., then maybe it would grab the reader more.

The other reason it sounds vague--imo--is that there are too many unnecesary words or words I don't really understand. For example, if you say:

You pick up the shovel that I hold

then you don't need to repeat:

-In both of our hands we are digging together

when you can just say something like, we begin to dig the earth or just, we begin to dig or we begin digging. And more specifically, if you picture these two people and the man is holding this shovel, would the woman reach down and pick it up? With his hands on it? No. She'd wrap her hands over his or near his. If you visualize it, you can usually get the best words to say what is happening.

And there are many places like the line I just quoted where you can cut back words you don't need. For example, this is long and wordy:

As I help you guide the shovel into the ground

when all you really need to say is something like, my hands guide yours--and maybe not even that because you've already establishing that you're digging together.

I think one of the best editorial exercises one can do is to reread what you've written and take out every single word you don't need. That may mean you have to reread your poem many times to keep chiseling away at it, but if you keep doing it you get better at seeing where to cut, how to say as much or more with fewer, more precise words.

And at all costs, you have to be able to identify and rewrite when you have words that just don't work, like widthless. This word is hard to say in the mind (my tongue kinda trips over it), and I am not even sure what it means. Thinner? Less width is thinner, but how can digging into earth be more or less thin? There's another way to say this, maybe something like:

Amazingly
It slips right in
the powdery sod

or

Amazingly
It slips right in
the pliant sod

Words like "widthless" have to be replaced with words that more clearly describe what you mean. I think a good rule is this: if you wouldn't typically use the word when you talk to people (friends, family, whoever), it probably won't work in your poem. Sometimes poets can make up words that are meaningful, but before you can start doing that you need to be precise elsewhere in a poem.

It's good to get feedback. Even if mine doesn't help, maybe someone else's will, so keep being brave and asking for feedback. People get uptight about feedback, but the more you get it, the less you care about "what people think," and you just take what you can use from it. That helps all of us. Everyone writes stuff that is vague and uses too many words or words that don't work, but if you keep writing every day and reading poetry, lots of different kinds of poetry, you will improve. Regular reading and writing forces you to think about how you can achieve the things you admire in other poems you read.

I hope that helps. There are good things in your poem like velvet dirt and wind taps across our arms. You just have to keep working to get everything in a poem to that level. If you can't do it in this one, write a new poem...and then another and so on.