Even though I walk - Feedback request

[Luna_lit]

Following a review from perks on a previous poem of mine - 'Flog me to death' I've been reading up on meter and form. Thanks perks! I can't seem to go back but have taken the comments on board. Here's my latest offering. Alway's striving to improve, I'd appreciate any pointers.


Even though I walk

Roaming, through the places you existed.
Light pieces of you, remaining to invade
my amnesia. I presume you knew I would walk
this trail. Did you leave a shard wittingly
to discompose this persuasive facade?

Echo's of you overprint my footsteps, each one
resounding death's bells, magnified for occasion.
Your laughter indicating something is wrong.
Of course, I knew it all along. You are dead.
Clarity can be found in the most artless of machination.

Revolting violence leaves a taste like metal
on my tongue. Walking where your blood poured,
images carved like graffiti in scarlet smears.
Each step taking me closer to the abhorrence
one black night when your form disappeared.

In sleep: Flying me to your corpse rigidly set
like stone in ice. Fastened together following
the invasion of science. Why do you cause me
to look upon your deadness every journey?
A cold cut anesthetized steeling through unfeeling.

I held you as a baby; little more than one myself.
I think I knew, thought I saw my baby brother pouring out
onto the pavement by a strangers blade. It's funny
how the dead tease us; walking us through spiral paths
tormenting, inviting precision and the erradication of doubt.



~luna

 

[doormouse]

I'm not worthy of criticising, being a beginner myself.

I just enjoyed reading. Great usage of words. ;-)

 

[Shadowsandflames]

Luna, I don't have any criticism for you, only praise. This is a wonderful poem. The dead do haunt us, if only in our hearts and minds. I love that it is not full of those overused metaphors that are sometimes so hard to avoid. The closest I can come to a criticism is that it seems to come off rather cold, which some people may not care for, although I am not one of them. I think that sometimes the strongest emotion are more like ice than fire. Then again, maybe it's just me. After all, all poems are in part what is written and in part what the reader believes it says. Anyway, wonderful poem. Keep writing.

S&F

 

[thenry]

Meter is very difficult to use and still come across as natural. I think this is an excellent first try. That said, some things you may want to look at:

Once you establish your meter, which I imagine to be iambic pentameter. With that idea it's easy to go back into your poem and come up with names for all the aberrations from iambic but the fact is that meter only works well if it is regular and you are substituting on just about every line. The rule of thumb is that there should be fewer substitutions per line than true iambs.

So the line "Clarity can be found in the most artless of machination." I would read as "Clarity can be found in the most artless of machination" which. My internal "iambispeak" voice wants to put other stresses into the line, but it will never work the way I actually speak.

But I may be wrong on the iambic front when you have lines like "images carved like graffiti in scarlet smears" which is more dactylic than anything. Then there are lines like: "In sleep: Flying me to your corpse rigidly set" which I cannot scan at all.

A lot of this I think would be easier to see and work with if you kept it simple at first, no substitutions, five simple feet per line, even if it means getting rid of the fancy words that need grammatical set up two lines away.

On a content note, I think your desire for good meter has encouraged you to make word choices which are starting to become nonsense. Take the sentence: "Did you leave a shard wittingly to discompose this persuasive facade?" I can almost read you original words and sentence before you twisted the syntax and the thesaurus came along. It's not natural speech.

But, it's pieces like this which make you realize how powerful meter can be. It almost adds a driving heartbeat.

 

[champagne1982]

Even though I walk

Roaming, through the places you existed.
Even though there is enjambment of this first line with your title, you shouldn't end it with a period. Try a comma here instead.
Light pieces of you, remaining to invade
the word light would be better as the subject noun in this line. So, perhaps, your light remains, invading would work just as well if only for its crispness.
my amnesia. I presume you knew I would walk
this trail. Did you leave a shard wittingly
to discompose this persuasive facade?
Interesting word choices here, but they are tough to get your tongue around. You may want to wrap the word wittingly in commas to make it a parenthetical statement and give your reader direction in breathing and inflection.
Echo's of you overprint my footsteps, each one
the word echo has a plural form echoes, the way you have it here is in the possessive and there is nothing for the echo to own.
resounding death's bells, magnified for occasion.
Your laughter indicating something is wrong.
you need to change the tense of the verb is I think. Your laughter indicating something was wrong. The ghost is laughing, in the present, about what happened in the past.
Of course, I knew it all along. You are dead.
Clarity can be found in the most artless of machination.

Revolting violence leaves a taste like metal
on my tongue. Walking where your blood poured,
place a comma after walking to change the phrase where your blood poured into an aside.
images carved like graffiti in scarlet smears.
you need another verb to make the phrase here complete such as: seeing images, envisioning them, remembering ...
Each step taking me closer to the abhorrence
You should explain abhorrence, it hangs there and begs an answer to the question, abhorrence of what? Is it the abhorrence you feel for violence or the abhorrence of the memory of the night?
one black night when your form disappeared. Are you attached to that numerical modifier one? Here you could join your thoughts of disgust with the night.
... the abhorrence
of that black night ...

In sleep: Flying me to your corpse rigidly set
place a comma after corpse to separate the two phrases.
like stone in ice. Fastened together following
The imagery of a stone in ice is perfect, I feel this.
the invasion of science. Why do you cause me
Where does science come into this situation? Do you mean an autopsy, maybe you could choose a word like forensics or perhaps you mean trauma surgery, so you could say medicine instead? Lastly, maybe you just want to find another word for the object of murder? Science forged the weapon, mixed the drug the killer was on, and couldn't save a life, so you want to blame it. I think science is too broad a term, though. Would savage knife fit as well? My mind, at least, insists on more detail, not more words, just one or two better, to explain your dream.
to look upon your deadness every journey?
A cold cut anesthetized steeling through unfeeling.
Would it be remiss to suggest that you switch the order of these last two sentences in this strophe? Consider:
Fastened together following the invasion
of the savage knife. A cold cut anesthetized:
steeling through unfeeling. Why do you cause me
to look upon your deadness every journey?

I held you as a baby; little more than one myself. You don't need to use a semi-colon here, the two clauses are very closely related thus a comma will suffice.
I think I knew, thought I saw my baby brother pouring out
You repeat the word baby, is there a simile you could use to replace one instance?
onto the pavement by a strangers blade. It's funny
how the dead tease us; walking us through spiral paths
Cause the reader to take a breath here.
tormenting, inviting precision and the erradication of doubt. eradication

You can edit a submitted poem. What you do is resubmit a complete rewrite with all of the options staying identical to the first version. Use the same title with the word edit included. In the Notes field on the submission page write a brief request that your edited version replace the poem already submitted. I have done this a couple of times and the site owners have been kind enough to make the changes without resetting the numbers of views or votes and rating. You only need realize that the place in queue for editing is far down the list of priorities as far as maintenance and submissions go.

I liked the poem and I hope you consider my suggestions as merely that. You absolutely do not need to accept any of them. Thanks for sharing your work.