literature

Return to Sender

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Literature Text

I push away the thought of you
lying in my bed
you’re swooping like a vulture
for the remnants in my head

Leaving little trails of hope
I’m reminded I’m alone
I can’t hear your voice
on the other end of this disconnected phone

But what you’ve left me with can’t survive
a holocaust of time
tempting me with the fate
of always being by myself and fine

Running back and forth
through the days I’ve lost forever
and not a care from you
to act as a god damn emotional tether

Floating away
on winds of change
I find my mind
somewhere out of range

And yet I owe
who I am to you
for all of that abuse
is all I ever knew

Now I’m broken
beat down and scarred
so why is giving up on you
really this fucking hard

Jumping in and out
of yes and maybe no
I find myself sinking
to an all-time low

I want you back
to torture me again
my love for you
has always been my greatest sin

So god forgive me
my trespasses again my gender
and return this love
to its god forsaken sender.
I am worried that this piece is a bit trite and then I wonder if that is okay. I'll ask a couple of questions:

-Is it trite?
-If so, is that okay?
-Is the message clear?
-Is it relatable?
-How is the flow?
-Would you change anything?

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Comments5
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DeiSophia's avatar
Critique for :iconthewrittenrevolution:

First of your meter in this is incredible. It blasted me away right from the start.
It changes at various places in the poem, but that just added to the effect, except for a few lines, but I'll explain what went wrong...
/     x    /   x   /        x        /   x
I push away the thought of you
/   x   /   x    /
lying in my bed
    /        x     /      x   /   x    /
you’re swooping like a vulture
  x   /      x     /     x   /    x
for the remnants in my head

In this first stanza you alternate between the iamb in the first two lines "da DUM da Dum" to the trochee in the second two lines "DA dum Da dum".
Iamb and trochee are pretty easy to interchange as they rely on the one to one relationship between the stressed and unstressed syllable, so you got a strong "hook" to catch your readers in the beginning.

However on this line it goes a little wrong:
  x   /    x   /    x    /    /    x    /   x    /     x
on the other end of this disconnected phone

See the double unstressed syllable there (the / represents unstressed). That interrupts the beat, oddly though I wouldn't recommend changing that part of the sentence, instead ou can fix this another way:
  x   /     x    /    x    /   x    /    x     /
on the end of this disconnected phone

If I remove the word "other" it shifts the pattern of emphasis, and recreates the meter, albeit some of the emphasis on the words changes, phone for instance becomes unstressed. However it better preserves the meter.

Another line where it goes wrong is here:
  x   /     x    /    /
So god forgive me
The repetition of the "e" sound leads to two unstressed syllables (it's just the way your mouth shapes the sounds) The only way to add a stress would be to change pronunciation which you really don't want to do. Again we can modify the sentene to change the stress pattern.
   x    /    x    /
God forgive me
 Has the desired effect, but it messes with other aspects (your syllable count for one) your grammar for another. Up to you how to work that one out.

There's a few other incorrect lines, if you read it aloud you'll spot them quite quickly.

A few notes on grammar:
beat down and scarred
beaten is the correct form of the verb for the tense your using. (also will fix the meter in this sentence)

my trespasses again my gender
I would remove the plural on the trespasses, and just make it one... I can't tell you why though, maybe it feels more dramatic or is more hyperbolic? I can't remember but there is an actual reason for this.
against  your word here was incorrect you need to use the preposition that relates to place (against) not the one that relates to time (again) because it is showing the relationship between the subject (my trespasses) and the object (my gender). This is not a temporal or causal relationship.

Oh wait! That's the reason, because you're adding a syllable in again/st you need to remove a syllable somewhere and that would be from the plural form of tres/pass/es

Your lack of punctuation, removes the lyrical aspects of the poem. Because this poem relies strongly on its phonetic qualities, you need to show where the pauses are, as well as where you need a rising intonation (intonation is not the same as stress by the way).

Take these lines for instance:
 /     x    /   x   /  x   /     x
so why is giving up on you
    x      /     x    /     x
really this fucking hard
There's your meter and your un/stressed syllables... Yet you've phrased this as a question.... so your voice will rise on the second line, while still stressing the words...
You need to add that question mark! It quickly shows the reader they need to change their intonation for this part (our mind actually reads ahead a little, of where we are processing meaning (there's a linguistic term for this but I can't remember what it is, and I don't have access to my textbooks at the moment).

Another sentence that could benefit from the question mark is this one:
Jumping in and out
of yes and maybe no

You'll want to emphasize that maybe a little bit by changing intonation (questions aren't always indicated by a "w" question word) Try it and see how it sounds when you raise the intonation on "maybe no"
I'll try trick your mind by writing it out..... "Jumping in and out of yes and maybe no?"

You'll find commas, as subtle and unobtrusive as they seem will have the same effect.

Why is changing intonation so important....
well in MattVoscinar 's wonderful critique below, he rightly complained about the "childish" effect of the strong rhythm, the best way to remove that overwhelming rhythm is to use pauses and to change your intonation on certain words. It removes the dominance of the rhythm and changes the focus to the words. You'll also find that when you're doing these two things, the rhythm will still be there, but far more subtle, as other features come to the surface.
Just try it out.... record yourself; first reading the poem as it is now, and then again after adding punctuation and see how it will immediately change.

As for his criticism on the imagery I have to agree with him.
You need much stronger nouns and verbs, and avoid abstract nouns if you can (although I think you will need to bear that in mind for future poems, the words in this one are too well embedded in the meter and rhyme scheme to pull out.
(It reads more like a pop song than actual poetry, because this use of abstract nouns is exactly why people slam pop songs as being "poor"art).


As for triteness, I don't think it's trite, although it is a bit dull (at least to my jaded eyes) See my pop song comment above. But here's the thing with asking a subjective question like "is it trite?" Your going to get personal responses. Whilst I can retain some objectivity when explaining the dramatic effect of rhythm or diction and connotation (yes it is objective, despite people saying it's not because words have established meanings according to culture, and a fast rhythm is fast, (you can actually measure the speed if its spoken for instance) The overall impression relating to the theme will always be subjective because of the reader's personal context (it's known as reader response theory and was invented by a man named Saussure, if you want to look it up). It is something to bear in mind when making art, you do need to be asking, "How will my audience respond to this?" at the same time as you ask, "Am  I developing my personal style?"
I get the feeling you're writing primarily for yourself at this point, and not thinking about the emotive affect (not effect, but that too Sweating a little... ) which is something you will need to think about, as it will enhance your writing, whether or not you have an intended audience... Why? Because it will make you more critically aware of what you're doing with imagery, diction and rhyme.

Good luck with your future writing!