First Post

[eharrison]

Hey I just mess around with poetry and I've always wondered if it was any good at all so just let me know if this is even passable! Also i don't even know what the form is so don't worry about that.

Belief born of sight at the junction of faith 
A man forever lost, origin without name 
The greatest of plights, myself and my wraith 
to search and find the inception of flame 

the colored crescent a mirage of the skyline
a cynical gift camouflaged behind sly time 
the treasure was promised indeed, in troves 
Alas, all he has found are the emperor's clothes 
lord falls low, jewel to thorn
Thin veil of grandeur forever torn 
mighty oak calls the humble leaf kin
See the tired traveler who could never be sin 
Crucify his god and deliver him to Eden

[Brownlie]

I don't think I can tell you if you're any good. 

Hey I just mess around with poetry and I've always wondered if it was any good at all so just let me know if this is even passable! Also i don't even know what the form is so don't worry about that.
 
--I think you should consider a title. 


Belief born of sight at the junction of faith 
A man forever lost, origin without name 
The greatest of plights, myself and my wraith 
to search and find the inception of flame -- Too many "of"

the colored crescent a mirage of the skyline
a cynical gift camouflaged behind sly time 
the treasure was promised indeed, in troves 
Alas, all he has found are the emperor's clothes -- I like these emperors clothes. Guy got jipped. 
lord falls low, jewel to thorn
Thin veil of grandeur forever torn 
mighty oak calls the humble leaf kin
See the tired traveler who could never be sin 
Crucify his god and deliver him to Eden

I had a hard time following, and there were a lot of big abstraction-like things or wordy things, like belief born of sight, greatest of plights, veil of grandeur, mighty oak (why is it mighty, and what is the wraith?). That's just an opinion. I did, however, like some of the ideas. Maybe write out what you're trying to say in prose and then poemify it in a clearer way? 

There's also the rhyming. Rhymes are cool, but I wouldn't overly contort a lot of things just to have rhymes. The rhymes don't really add more than a good description can. 

I can't really think of a good descriptive poem, but good descriptions are a hallmark of good writtens (spelled wrong on purpose) to me. 

This is a Whitman poem about compost, better known as hippy poop and trash piles. 

Behold this compost! behold it well!
Perhaps every mite has once form'd part of a sick person--Yet behold!
The grass of spring covers the prairies,
The bean bursts noislessly through the mould in the garden, 20
The delicate spear of the onion pierces upward,
The apple-buds cluster together on the apple-branches,
The resurrection of the wheat appears with pale visage out of its
graves,

See, he's talking about crap you can visualize and whatnot, which to me is hard to do and can be time consuming. 


Good luck with your writtens.

[Richard]

Hey eharrison,
Welcome to the site

I agree with a lot of what Brownlie said in his critique. My biggest suggestion would be to think about redoing this poem without any rhyming. There are times in this poem when certain words feel like they are being used just to make a rhyme. As well, if you a determined to continue rhyming, your rhyme scheme needs to be consistent. I'll go into more detail below:

Hey I just mess around with poetry and I've always wondered if it was any good at all so just let me know if this is even passable! Also i don't even know what the form is so don't worry about that.

Belief born of sight at the junction of faith 
A man forever lost, origin without name - What would you name a person's origin? The Big Bang? God? Mom? This is a bit unclear.
The greatest of plights, myself and my wraith 
to search and find the inception of flame -Why is fire so important? How is it linked to humanity's origin? This is one of times where it feels like your rhyming is taking over what you are trying to communicate in this poem.

the colored crescent a mirage of the skyline
a cynical gift camouflaged behind sly time -I really like this line. I like it so much that I suggest writing a whole poem about this image.
the treasure was promised indeed, in troves 
Alas, all he has found are the emperor's clothes 
lord falls low, jewel to thorn
Thin veil of grandeur forever torn 
mighty oak calls the humble leaf kin
See the tired traveler who could never be sin 
Crucify his god and deliver him to Eden

Overall, I think you have some images here that you could use if you choose to workshop this piece. I look forward to seeing what you decide to do with this poem.

Keep writing,
Richard

[Radetof.Yahska]

Hey,

For some reason, this reminds me of the Malazan series, by Steven Erikson. This could morph into an epic fantasy poem if you wish to work on it.

Belief born of sight at the junction of faith 
A man forever lost, origin without name                    This true name of things trope is a common element in fantasy. Intentional? if not, why is it here?
The greatest of plights, myself and my wraith            Wraith came from nowhere
to search and find the inception of flame                   A seemingly random quest. This stanza could be expanded to give more meaning to the quest and its nature

the colored crescent a mirage of the skyline
a cynical gift camouflaged behind sly time                 This and the preceding line are a little confusing for me
the treasure was promised indeed, in troves 
Alas, all he has found are the emperor's clothes         Hehe. Reminds me of a story I read as a kid, "The emperor's clothes"
lord falls low, jewel to thorn
Thin veil of grandeur forever torn                             This is slightly confusing, again. Did he see him naked, dispelling his grandeur?
mighty oak calls the humble leaf kin
See the tired traveler who could never be sin 
Crucify his god and deliver him to Eden                    Good end, but would be more meaningful with more coverage
[/quote]


I look forward to a longer version of this poem!

[CRNDLSM]

You have some good things and not so good things.

Hey I just mess around with poetry and I've always wondered if it was any good at all so just let me know if this is even passable! Also i don't even know what the form is so don't worry about that.

Belief born of sight at the junction of faith sight of what
A man forever lost, origin without name is this man what you see, or are you the man
The greatest of plights, myself and my wraith I always want to use wraith with faith but it always sounds cheesy to me, 
to search and find the inception of flame is inception of flame the belief born of sight?

the colored crescent a mirage of the skyline
a cynical gift camouflaged behind sly time I actually like skyline and sly time
the treasure was promised indeed, in troves in troves huh for rhyme, although it's not out of place with the language you're using
Alas, all he has found are the emperor's clothes I dont like alas but it's not out of place either to me
lord falls low, jewel to thornclothes often represent righteousness, emperors clothes means naked? Kind of shamed?
Thin veil of grandeur forever torn 
mighty oak calls the humble leaf kin Maybe not all oaks are so friendly
See the tired traveler who could never be sin this the man who went from jewel to thorn
Crucify his god and deliver him to Eden 

The lofty language loses me, ultimately I don't t understand
  Belief born of sight of a man who lost everything, belief and the desire to kill him? Is Eden heaven, I guess deliver him to Eden means heaven will be earth at the end.  I don't know if it's any good, goodness, Good luck

[Chorus]

Hey I just mess around with poetry and I've always wondered if it was any good at all so just let me know if this is even passable! Also i don't even know what the form is so don't worry about that.

Belief born of sight at the junction of faith 
A man forever lost, origin without name 
The greatest of plights, myself and my wraith 
to search and find the inception of flame 

the colored crescent a mirage of the skyline
a cynical gift camouflaged behind sly time 
the treasure was promised indeed, in troves 
Alas, all he has found are the emperor's clothes 
lord falls low, jewel to thorn
Thin veil of grandeur forever torn 
mighty oak calls the humble leaf kin
See the tired traveler who could never be sin 
Crucify his god and deliver him to Eden

You have me lost. I do not understand what is happening in the final  parts of the poem,  and it's my belief that if a poem does not deliver a message or sentiment to the reader, the poem has ultimately failed it's truest intentions.

So, how can we fix this?

For one, I think you're sacrificing too much to rhyming. Rhyming is not the cornerstone of poetry. A poem does not need to rhyme. I would drop the rhyme entirely if I were you, since it seems to take more than it gives.

Second, I would extent the length of the poem. You seem to try to pack a ton of ideas into a small amount of space. Elaborate on those ideas, and elaborate on what exactly is happening in the poem. 

I like the idea of someone going to the end of a rainbow, but instead of finding gold, they find something which makes them realize the frivolousness of their quest. Awesome idea. I think if you expand the a bit and drop the rhyme scheme, you could have something really special

[typing mantis]

I am quite new here, so I apologize if my comments are a bit vague, but I will try and be as helpful as possible.
I find your descriptions very vivid, maybe because you describe every object in your poem with adjectives, such as 'sly time', 'cynical gift', etc. So thats really great!

suggestions and criticisms:

I wish you had given your poem a nice name.
In the line 'A man forever lost, origin without name', the part after the comma doesn't seem to fit quite right. Maybe 'A man forever lost, of nameless origin'?
Are the last two lines spoken by the mighty oak? If so, then maybe you could use quotation marks to indicate this.