A walk among the tombstones

[the man with the spoon]

A walk among the tombstones

A walk among the tombstones,
I look upon a star.
The night of moon is on us,
you wander off too far.
Your breathing starts to quicken,
my heart begins to race.
The trees once sparse now thicken
I long for your embrace.
The clouds, they start to cover,
the moonlight we once shared.
From sight, I now have lost you,
that thought renders me scared.
A love I thought was rising,
like the moon, that glowing ball.
The star I once was eyeing,
now begins to fall.

[dukealien]

A walk among the tombstones

A walk among the tombstones,
I look upon a star.
The night of moon is on us,
you wander off too far.
Your breathing starts to quicken,
my heart begins to race.
The trees once sparse now thicken
I long for your embrace.
The clouds, they start to cover,
the moonlight we once shared.
From sight, I now have lost you,
that thought renders me scared.
A love I thought was rising,
like the moon, that glowing ball.
The star I once was eyeing,
now begins to fall.

Overall:  Very atmospheric; reminds one of Edgar Allan Poe's lost ladies (Lenore, etc.) but less mordant.

Caught my eye:  Interesting turn of phrase, "night of moon" - draws attention to the darkness which prevails where the moon is not, even on nights when it is.

Gentle correction, independent of other suggestions:  l.1 should end with a semicolon rather than a comma - it's independent of l.2.  Similarly, semicolon after "thicken" at the end of l.7 (replacing nothing).  L.7 also needs a couple of commas, one after "trees," the other after "sparse."  L.5 should *probably* also end with a semicolon instead of a colon.

Rhyme scheme:  Not all your quatrains (groups of four lines) rhyme ABAB, which is fine; not mandatory, of course, and since the first quatrain doesn't enforce this rule, readers are on notice that it will be optional.

Rhythm/meter/word choice:  There are points at which the meter (sequence of accented and unaccented syllables) could be eased by substituting  one more specific word for a pair of more general-purpose words.  For example, l.14, "like the moon, that glowing ball," could become "moonlike, an opal ball," or the like; similarly, l.2 "The night of moon is on us" might become "The night of moon surrounds us."

The last line's curtness works.  It could also be lengthened to conform to meter, for example, "[The star I once was eyeing]/with hope, begins to fall."

This is an interesting poem that could be rewritten to advantage; you might return to it with that idea after writing a few more.

[rayheinrich]

A walk among the tombstones

01     A walk among the tombstones,
02     I look upon a star.
03     The night of moon is on us,
04     you wander off too far.
05     Your breathing starts to quicken,
06     my heart begins to race.
07     The trees once sparse now thicken
08     I long for your embrace.
09     The clouds, they start to cover,
10     the moonlight we once shared.
11     From sight, I now have lost you,
12     that thought renders me scared.
13     A love I thought was rising,
14     like the moon, that glowing ball.
15     The star I once was eyeing,
16     now begins to fall.

Broken rhythm:
12, 14, and 16 should go: di DAH di DAH di DAH
but 12 goes: di DAH DAH di di DAH because "render" 's accent is on its first syllable
14 goes di di DAH di DAH di DAH because that "like" (or the "the") adds an extra syllable
16 goes DAH di DAH di DAH , it's missing a syllable at the start

This poem is like the stuff I used to write when I first started.

Simplistic story:
Your love gets lost in the woods. You get scared you won't find her.

Artificial language:
I thought poems were written in some language that wasn't like the one I used every day.
They aren't.

Imagery:
Your trees don't have roots to trip over, or rough bark, or smell, or make sounds in the wind.

Cliché:
"look upon a star", "breathing starts to quicken",  "my heart begins to race",
"I long for your embrace", "I now have lost you", "the moon, that glowing ball"

Awkward phrases:
"The night of moon is on us", "From sight, I now have lost you", "renders me scared",
"The star I once was eyeing"

Illogical connections:
What does loosing someone in the woods have to do with loosing that someone's love?
Yes, there's a possible metaphor there; but the poem is too literal to support it.

The first thing you might do is make your story more interesting: Why are you walking
through tombstones? How did you get into the woods? Maybe you're getting away from
her/his parents to have sex? (Tawdry, but interesting.)

Anyway... You should write a more interesting story down in everyday English prose.
You could make the setting more detailed, provide good reasons for the character's actions,
include details about the relationship.

While you are doing this it might help to forget you're thinking of making it into a poem.
This would help you suppress the urge to use that fake poem language.

When you do get to making it into a poem, you might consider writing it in free verse.
This would help you concentrate on the story, the natural language, the imagery without
having to subconsciously worry about fitting it into metric feet and rhyming.

Once you came up with a free verse one you liked, you could then decide to translate it into
a more structured form.

Sounds like a lot of work. It is. But remember this isn't about re-writing a single poem,
it's about learning to write all the rest that are to follow.

But cheer up. Your rhythm, your attention to meter, was pretty good. 13 of your lines are perfect,
and the other three had only minor defects.

We all begin like this. And (dare I admit it?) this is actually much better than the poems
I used to write.

ray

[elviaje26]

A walk among the tombstones

A walk among the tombstones,
I look upon a star.
The night of moon is on us,
you wander off too far.
Your breathing starts to quicken,
my heart begins to race.
The trees once sparse now thicken
I long for your embrace.
The clouds, they start to cover,
the moonlight we once shared.
From sight, I now have lost you,
that thought renders me scared.
A love I thought was rising,
like the moon, that glowing ball.
The star I once was eyeing,
now begins to fall.

Just my honest commentary here. I feel like this poem has cliche everywhere in this poem and not much was new or something indivdualized to the author. The ryhme scheme is a bit simple and throughs me off a bit. The poem has excellent flow and rhyme. I think it would help if you wrote more about the fear in the graveyard and the reason you were there.

-Clay

[samyarb]

I really enjoyed reading this poem, it had a great flow. I like the overall theme of the poem, and the description of place/time of day. However there were quite a few cliches such as "look upon a star", "long for your embrace", "heart begins to race', etc. Also, I think you should re-think this line: " From sight, I now have lost you,that thought renders me scared." It just doesn't sound right. 

[billy]

lots of cliche; try and be as original as possible
once the cliche is sorted out, post an edit. there is too much to fix all at once in novice

A walk among the tombstones

A walk among the tombstones, the opening line holds the reader
I look upon a star. and the 2nd loses the reader...all is lost
The night of moon is on us,
you wander off too far.
Your breathing starts to quicken,
my heart begins to race.
The trees once sparse now thicken
I long for your embrace.
The clouds, they start to cover,
the moonlight we once shared.
From sight, I now have lost you, inversion seldom works well, this is no exception.
that thought renders me scared.
A love I thought was rising,
like the moon, that glowing ball.
The star I once was eyeing,
now begins to fall.