A Million Pieces

Post Reply New Topic

I wrote this poem for my school talent show last year. Thoughts?

A Million Pieces

They all say that he's crazy
They all think he's insane
They've all heard that he's lazy
So he must love her for her name
And they'll all tell her what he's saying
Will never be the truth
And they'll all tell her to get away
Before he breaks her heart into
A million pieces flowing around
She runs like a schoolgirl trying to catch them now
She won't hold his hand, though he tries
To break the glass window she's behind
Her raven hair fall below
But he wants to lie down in the snow
The bird is low, the stars are high
She touches him, so he is blind
Their friends kiss
Their friends hug
Their friends smile
Because they're so smug
Why don't they understand
They're the leaders of the land
He plays games
He does tricks
Praying that his aim will never miss
Because to him, those sky blue eyes are bliss
A million pieces flowing around
She runs like a schoolgirl trying to catch them now

Okay. Before I offer my thoughts, a bit of context. I'm a serious writer. I'd rather have my work ripped to shreds, and learn how to improve my writing through that experience, even if my work is already better than average... And I've hit the point where I read published works and spot the flaws. (I found a huge flaw in one of Martin Cruz Smith's books, for example.) On the other hand, I won't waste my time offering comments on work I don't think has promise. So it's not all bad. (Although I also might simply miss a post, if someone posts something which makes me think 'that's crap, they'll never make a writer', I won't even waste the time to write that one line comment. It will hurt them, and what for? They can't learn to be a writer anyway. So what I'm trying to say is, if I bother to comment at all, that in itself is a compliment on your work.

Okay, if you haven't shut your eyes and closed this window least you read on....

This is interesting, and has a great deal of potential. I do think you need to work to tighten it up and make what you are saying clearer and sharper than it is. (I know this is hard. It might take you a couple of years to become good enough to do a poem with this sort of potential justice.) I also think the work involved would be time well spent. If you don't think you can give it what it needs now, set it aside. Keep writing. A lot. Just putting words on paper, then going back and seeing how you can improve them, will help you improve. Either way, don't throw this one away. And keep a draft of it as it is, before you start to work on it, because until you're very good at self-editing, it is easy to make a poem worse, not better.

Do keep writing. If you could write something like this, you have potential.