Down at the Bottom

[HaleINthewind]

I look on at you. ( look at you should be just fine less wordy same thing)

You sit listless in the dark.( sitting listless in the dark ; a way to avoid the overuse of you)

I see you in shadow and in silhouette;  ( the recommendation to cut the ands and ins is a good one. I think it strengthens the images you are trying to produce )

in blackness and despair.

 

You smile for a bit,

but it’s too much work.

That spark in your eye dissipates –

replaced by a hollow stare.

 

You follow me,

moving fluidly as I move.

You whisper to my soul -

echoing my heart.



You struggle to keep up. (struggling to keep up ; again avoid over use of you)

You gather your broken pieces,

arranged like a bouquet of glass shards.

You begin to fall apart.  ( I think that if someone is already gathering their broken pieces then it can be assumed they have already fallen apart- I would introduce something new here)



You rock incessantly

Faintly reciting songs your mother used to sing

Your skin is pale and your eyes like dark, stagnant pools ( I know I am on a you rampage but maybe cut the  2nd yours in this line)

You grow colder and more distant than ever before



I plunge into the depths of you

There is not longing, or hopelessness or caring

Light cannot penetrate this realm

Heavy like a stone, I sink to the floor

 

On the long way down

I watch a cavalcade of memories resurface and swirl in my head

I am dizzy with colors and sounds

It is too much

 

I breathe in and begin to let go
I will rest here at the depths of your soul ( I am not sure if anything has been learned or moved forward with this ending, what did you really get out of witnessing and becoming this "you"? What have you learned and what can I as a reader and you as a writer take with me?

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Author's Note: I have long resisted learning the "rules" of poetry.  I always held that they were restrictive and even pretentious to true uninhibited expression - that was just my ignorance.  I posted a poem yesterday that I wrote back in Feb 2015.   I received a lot of very constructive feedback.  Sadly, mostly the consensus was that it wasn't particularly good.  Here is a piece I wrote this month.  It will probably be the last piece that I post for awhile.  I am going to begin studying the "art of poetry"  and take the feelings from my other pieces and rework them into new poetry before I bombard you all with anything further.

Thanks for reading and thank you for your honest assessments of my work undefined.
 
Best to you all!

Hey there, super new to all of this. Along with my above suggestions, I wonder if it would be beneficial for you and your poem to strengthen some of the imagery- I am not totally sure but I wonder if some of it may borderline on cliche. Exp. "heavy like a stone,"  I am not totally sure but maybe something to think about.  Hopefully you find some of this helpful and objective( that's the hard part).  Thanks for the read- cheers!