passing me by

[indarican]

Passing me by
I sit and watch with a solemn heart.
My voice laughs, but my soul cries.
I pretend to be in the great fight
When I already know that I have lost.
Never to see the sun, endless night
Has clouded my vision.
I wonder was there ever a time
That there was someone to listen?
I doubt this strongly,
They’re main concern, themselves.
Never another soul, no patience for me.
Passing me by
I have lived with holy devotion
To the life that is only a lie.
One might wonder, how I,
The one with years of laughter
Can only want to cry.
The truth, my spirit is near over flow
And the tears of my life
Have nowhere left to go.
I will sit and watch as time,
Love, laughter, and friends
Just past me by

[Mitul Yadav]

I think the piece was pretty good, and evoked a rather depressive feeling, the last three lines being the highlight. But, what does not work in the favor of the piece is the vagueness as there is no indication as to what causes the author so much sadness.

"One might wonder, how I,
The one with years of laughter
Can only want to cry."

One, actually does wonder.

Also, the sentence structure, specifically in:
"One might wonder, how I,
The one with years of laughter
Can only want to cry."
hampers the smoothness of the reading a little, i think, due to an abruptly short third line.

All in all, i enjoyed the read
Pretty piece. Cheers.

[indarican]

I think the piece was pretty good, and evoked a rather depressive feeling, the last three lines being the highlight. But, what does not work in the favor of the piece is the vagueness as there is no indication as to what causes the author so much sadness.

"One might wonder, how I,
The one with years of laughter
Can only want to cry."

One, actually does wonder.

Also, the sentence structure, specifically in:
"One might wonder, how I,
The one with years of laughter
Can only want to cry."
hampers the smoothness of the reading a little, i think, due to an abruptly short third line.

All in all, i enjoyed the read
Pretty piece. Cheers.

Thank you for your feedback. When writing I was trying to touch on the dual faces of depression, basically those that can smile through life but are really hurting on the inside.

[mongolfiere]

Hi!

I really like your mission with this piece and I like a lot of your lines. For example, "My voice laughs, but my soul cries." I think that someone everyone can connect to, even if they have never experienced such profound depression. However, I do agree with that there is a sense of vagueness within this poem. I understand what you're talking about, I am just finding it difficult to connect. Instead of telling me "I pretend to be in the great fight" could you show why or how? I feel that way about the lines "I have lived with holy devotion / To the life that is only a lie." Perhaps you can describe how your persona attempts to mimic or mirror leading a normal life as they have seen others do so and how mentally and physically exhausting that is for someone struggling with depression.

Again, I really enjoy this piece and what it represents I just feel as though you can go deeper with it and make people who don't know what your persona is feeling get a glimpse of that world.

Keep up the good work!

-mongolfiere

[indarican]

Hi!

I really like your mission with this piece and I like a lot of your lines. For example, "My voice laughs, but my soul cries." I think that someone everyone can connect to, even if they have never experienced such profound depression. However, I do agree with that there is a sense of vagueness within this poem. I understand what you're talking about, I am just finding it difficult to connect. Instead of telling me "I pretend to be in the great fight" could you show why or how? I feel that way about the lines "I have lived with holy devotion / To the life that is only a lie." Perhaps you can describe how your persona attempts to mimic or mirror leading a normal life as they have seen others do so and how mentally and physically exhausting that is for someone struggling with depression.

Again, I really enjoy this piece and what it represents I just feel as though you can go deeper with it and make people who don't know what your persona is feeling get a glimpse of that world.

Keep up the good work!

-mongolfiere

Thank you for your input, Ill work on cutting some of the vagueness.

[ellajam]

I can tell from your writing that you are very aware of how you, specifically, live with depression.

I just want to take the opportunity to remind everyone

The poem is not the poet.

Part of the fun of writing is we can take any part we want to whether or not we have personally experienced it.

Remember, critique is not about the OP or ourselves, it is about the poem.

Welcome to The Pig Pen, hope you enjoy it.
ella/mod

[tectak]

Hello,
As this is posted in novice I will only point out what you may already know....if that seems unhelpful then I would add one other thing. Check your work thoroughly before posting...of course, for errors like "they're" instead of "their" (L10), but also because readability is important. It is difficult to decide if L1 is, in fact, "Passing me by" or is it the title? The difficulty is compounded by the lack of meter or rhyme...neither of which are necessary but if you insist on capitalising every line-start, a retro and outdated quirk of poetic elitism, then you must have some emphatic way of indicating pauses, emphases and emotion in the piece which are not confused by those purposeless capital letters.
The overall theme of this, then, is the depressing wish to include as many cliched or overused expressions as possible in order to make a familiar problem even more familiar. Depression dissemination, written  in first person, is a rich area for exloring wildly imaginative thoughts. The gravity of depression is not to be skimmed over. If you want to REALLY make deeply profound points they MUST be new...so contrary to what you may be trying to achieve you lighten the piece by the homeliness of familiarity. Get out on a high-wire and feel the fear of falling...

Solemn heart
soul cries
great fight
never to see the sun
endless night
clouded vision
someone to listen
life that is a lie
want to cry
tears of life
nowhere to go

All the above will throw up (no pun intended) reams on a google search. That is NOT to say you have failed permanently, just that you have only succeeded momentarily....you need MORE moments. It is NOT easy to fnd new ways of making the common rare, and with this subject, like Love, it is one of THE most difficult exercises to pull off. If you really want a suggestion, get yourself a metaphor for depression and start with that. Choose something at the limit of your imagination and work your thinking around it without losing sight of it. I could give you ideas (everyone could), but you will have your own...and anyway, mine might be crap.( Just don't use a black dog for your metaphor...Churchill and I have used it already )
best,
tectak

Passing me by
I sit and watch with a solemn heart.
My voice laughs, but my soul cries.
I pretend to be in the great fight
When I already know that I have lost.
Never to see the sun, endless night
Has clouded my vision.
I wonder was there ever a time
That there was someone to listen?
I doubt this strongly,
They’re main concern, themselves.
Never another soul, no patience for me.
Passing me by
I have lived with holy devotion
To the life that is only a lie.
One might wonder, how I,
The one with years of laughter
Can only want to cry.
The truth, my spirit is near over flow
And the tears of my life
Have nowhere left to go.
I will sit and watch as time,
Love, laughter, and friends
Just past me by

[billy]

on reading i have to agree with tecktak. the many clichés weaken any chance of it being a good poem. search out the common phrases and discard them for something with substance and originality. use as was suggested metaphor or/and simile. we all know what depression is. make your view of it a unique one.
notice i said view and not speech. how do you see it? i am a broken eggshell. i am bereft of flesh, i am a lost sock....be adventurous. as long as you ground the poem there are few limits as to what you can say.

[bena]

Yes, the cliche monster has reached out and grabbed you; it happens to the best of us. It just takes time to realize--study your words, and think to yourself, have I heard this phrase before? If so, try something different to keep your poetry fresh.

As this is---it is screaming for white space and definition of stanzas And I say this one nearly all the time---i would lose the caps on each line as that is an archaic way to write...They used the caps on each line back when presses first came out so that the editor would know where to drop down and get the lines straight...in the media we use today it is unnecessary and a bit distracting.

This is also screaming for some imagery to anchor the point. Right now it is completely narrative, which can work on occasion, but most people would rather be inside the story instead of being an outsider looking in.

Hope this helps!

mel/bena

[poe_enthusiast]

I would have to agree with some of the other posts. I do think the poem is very vague but well done in the emotional aspect. Adding some concrete details and strong lines would really help this poem become something wonderful.

[indarican]

thank you all for the feedback. I will work on the cliches in my poetry. I have been writing for a long time but never really let any see or read my work so every ones feedback is appreciated!

[tectak]

thank you all for the feedback. I will work on the cliches in my poetry. I have been writing for a long time but never really let any see or read my work so every ones feedback is appreciated!

Ahhhh yes....the infinite joy of writing in isolation How wrong can you NEVER be!

I look forward to seeing your work on this one...grab that metaphor like a thief's hand on a Rolex!

Good egg,
tectak