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I'm new to creating poems, this is actually my first! I need to practice quite a bit. I just revised the poem based upon critiques.
sifting through the notions of our origin
burdened with the sentiment of isolation
diligent deliberation of eternity
under the influence of despair
one may presume the soul to be
of memory's collection,
aimlessly adrift;
through perpetual
darkness
Posts: 17
Threads: 6
Joined: Feb 2018
Good first effort. Free form poetry can seem so easy, but even it can be daunting sometimes because even with a non rhyming verse you still need a bit of flow and structure. Consider this slight revision:
Sifting through the notions of our origin.
Burdened with the sentiment of isolation.
Diligent deliberation of eternity.
Under the influence of despair.
One may presume the soul to be
a collection of memories
set aimlessly adrift
through perpetual
darkness.
Posts: 52
Threads: 12
Joined: Sep 2017
too much intellectual forefront can have that monotonous tone effect, but that doesn't necessarily indicate a lack of depth in your style.
I would like to elaborate on @TemporaryForever 's revision, as I think in terms of poetry, less means more
I think generally you wanted to pack a lot of information into a small amount of lines
so in terms of density, let's see how concentrated we can retain your ideas with the least amount of words:
(03-08-2018, 02:57 PM)TemporaryForever Wrote: Sifting through the notions of our origin.
Burdened with the sentiment of isolation.
Diligent deliberation of eternity.
Under the influence of despair.
One may presume the soul to be
a collection of memories
set aimlessly adrift
through perpetual
darkness.
Searching our origin
burdened with isolation
eternity, sought deliberately
under the influence of despair
the soul to be
of memory's collection,
aimlessly adrift;
through perpetual
darkness
I don't want to give the impression that amputating your initial writings is always a good thing, because its most definitely not
but less does mean more, most of the time, and your freeflow is a good example of discovering just what that means!
assholery not intended .
Posts: 8
Threads: 2
Joined: Mar 2018
(03-08-2018, 02:57 PM)TemporaryForever Wrote: Good first effort. Free form poetry can seem so easy, but even it can be daunting sometimes because even with a non rhyming verse you still need a bit of flow and structure. Consider this slight revision:
Sifting through the notions of our origin.
Burdened with the sentiment of isolation.
Diligent deliberation of eternity.
Under the influence of despair.
One may presume the soul to be
a collection of memories
set aimlessly adrift
through perpetual
darkness. I love it! thankyou, it does make sense to add a bit of flow to the poem. I really appreciate your input!
(03-08-2018, 04:19 PM)cloud Wrote: too much intellectual forefront can have that monotonous tone effect, but that doesn't necessarily indicate a lack of depth in your style.
I would like to elaborate on @TemporaryForever 's revision, as I think in terms of poetry, less means more
I think generally you wanted to pack a lot of information into a small amount of lines
so in terms of density, let's see how concentrated we can retain your ideas with the least amount of words:
(03-08-2018, 02:57 PM)TemporaryForever Wrote: Sifting through the notions of our origin.
Burdened with the sentiment of isolation.
Diligent deliberation of eternity.
Under the influence of despair.
One may presume the soul to be
a collection of memories
set aimlessly adrift
through perpetual
darkness.
Searching our origin
burdened with isolation
eternity, sought deliberately
under the influence of despair
the soul to be
of memory's collection,
aimlessly adrift;
through perpetual
darkness
I don't want to give the impression that amputating your initial writings is always a good thing, because its most definitely not
but less does mean more, most of the time, and your freeflow is a good example of discovering just what that means! Oh wow! I haven't thought about simplicity, the idea makes me excited!
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Threads: 8
Joined: Jan 2018
Hi Lorvick,
I like how this poem starts out, with repeating of d- words in the 3rd and fourth line. However, this premise of cleverness and mockery is lost as the poem continues to be serious - for that, with "heavy" sounding words, you need some really profound and extremely original revelation to carry it through (the only good example that comes to mind, as far as free form poetry is concerned, is Rilke's Duino Elegies) - and that is hard to do in a short poem - you need to elaborate on your reasoning to allow the reader to follow you. Otherwise you need something to lift the mood - such as, say - an image of the narrator contemplating this in the loo.
What I feel goes most strongly against this poem is the lack of images anchoring it, you know, somewhere. There's just some words that lays out a few seconds of thought process - profound, but not going anywhere. There needs to be something happening - a sequence of events, imageries - anything, really - to "show" what the poem says.
Also, if you revise your poem, the usual practice is to keep all versions so that readers can point you back if they think one of the previous versions (in part or full) was better: see this thread on how to hide previous versions in your post: Formatting code for hiding original
(03-08-2018, 12:19 PM)Lorvick Wrote: I'm new to creating poems, this is actually my first! I need to practice quite a bit. I just revised the poem based upon critiques.
sifting through the notions of our origin
burdened with the sentiment of isolation
diligent deliberation of eternity
under the influence of despair
one may presume the soul to be
of memory's collection,
aimlessly adrift;
through perpetual
darkness
Posts: 345
Threads: 34
Joined: Feb 2017
hi lorvick
sifting through the notions of our origin -I like how notions is used here
burdened with the sentiment of isolation
[diligent deliberation of eternity
under the influence of despair] -powerful 2 lines here, to me, this influence hopes,
one may presume the soul to be waits for kind and peaceful opportunity.
of memory's collection, - I like presumption in this verse
aimlessly adrift;
through perpetual -not sure about perpetual, sometimes we are surprised
darkness at least happy when someone flips the switch
I think you did wonderfully for your very first poem. Perhaps you are gifted! I like the form and how it funnels down to little, allowing the word darkness less
power or significance and may even hint at darkness' end. Not sure the title justifies the work, though quite an interesting title, to say the least!
-nibbed
there's always a better reason to love
(03-08-2018, 12:19 PM)Lorvick Wrote: I'm new to creating poems, this is actually my first! I need to practice quite a bit. I just revised the poem based upon critiques.
sifting through the notions of our origin not sure about the use of second person “our” here. The rest of the poem feels very meta, the word “our” not so much. I would also consider cutting “the” in “the notions”
burdened with the sentiment of isolation
diligent deliberation of eternity this alliteration is a bit much. It seems gratuitous. I can’t make this line connect with the first two, and I’m not sure the first two make a complete thought. Maybe you need a bridge between the two thoughts.
under the influence of despair
one may presume the soul to be these last two lines flow together fine, but if you add the line above, it again feels like there is something missing sentence wise. Poetry doesn’t always have to make perfect complete sentences, but I think this is a bit jarring.
of memory's collection,
aimlessly adrift;
through perpetual
darkness I like the everlasting life/space metaphor. Perhaps the title is a little too concrete.
Thanks.
Hi Lorvick! I mainly create Free Verse material as well and I really enjoyed this one. Just my take on it.
Sifting through the notions of our origin.
Burdened with the sentiment of isolation.
Diligent deliberation of eternity.
Under the influence of despair. ( being Isolated and yet deliberating with"eternity" may seem clouded or confusing to some a different image might help convey the thought.)
One may presume the soul to be
a collection of memories ( I think you nailed it on these two lines and shows a great image in the mind of the reader)
set aimlessly adrift
through perpetual
darkness.(The ending was on a nice tone that fit the rest of the piece. )
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Threads: 230
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Hi Lorvick,
When we're new to poems as you say you are, it's quite common to use a lot of abstract concepts that aren't accessible to the senses  notions of our origin, sentiment of isolation, deliberation of eternity, influence of despair, soul, memory's collection, etc). The problem with this amount of abstraction is that it has a sense of being deep but it's actually inaccessible to the reader.
Usually, it's better to fix the poem in a concrete moment from the observation of the poem can be anchored. Think of Wordsworth for instance, "I wandered lonely as a cloud" Just adding the image gives a sense of the loneliness the poet is trying to convey. That's the power of concrete imagery. Lonely is abstract but the cloud anchors the image. You talk about isolation, the weight of time, memory, etc. These are broad areas people wrestle with--ground them with a consistent use of imagery and you'll be taking this poem closer to what you need it to be.
Just some thoughts.
Best,
Todd
(03-08-2018, 12:19 PM)Lorvick Wrote: I'm new to creating poems, this is actually my first! I need to practice quite a bit. I just revised the poem based upon critiques.
sifting through the notions of our origin
burdened with the sentiment of isolation
diligent deliberation of eternity
under the influence of despair
one may presume the soul to be
of memory's collection,
aimlessly adrift;
through perpetual
darkness
The secret of poetry is cruelty.--Jon Anderson
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