Source
r/OCPoetry•
somepoet

Coffee and Tea

Feedback Received!

I think the stirring we felt inside ourselves could've been
our souls being stirred back together like they were meant to be
Coffee with cream, milk in a cup of tea-
The milky way never made as much sense as it does
in the context of you and me:

First, the stirring for the stars to form
faster and brighter, something more than before
closer and tighter 'round a central core

The hotter the burning, the brighter the light
the brighter the light, the shorter the life-
pushed further apart, explosion into night

We were a star-
always and all at once,
leaving lacking light; the only thing still 'ours'.

1 2

Posted Nov 29, 2017, 5:09 PM UTC · edited

75
hot10trot•

I am not sure if it was intentional or not, but I like the way it teeters between free verse and a strict rhyme scheme - becoming less tight towards the end. It emphasizes the idea of stirring and the milky way, especially with the shortening lines.

On the subject of the milky way, given that a lot of strength of this poem's flow comes from its similarity to the rhythm of human speech I would remove the word 'galaxy' from the first verse.

Another thing - the lines 'We were a star-\ always and all at once' sounds intense but they don't actually seem convey anything.

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somepoetOP•

Thanks for the feedback, it was mildly intentional that I didn't stick to a strict rhyme scheme throughout the entire poem- I wanted it to read as starting strong, teetering as you said, and then ending abruptly- sort of like the content described.

I'm not sure how I feel about removing the word galaxy, I'll keep it in mind for a while because it might just be because I like that first verse most of all of them and am reluctant to change it- I need to say it a few times to realize whether or not it affects the flow.

Finally, "We were a star-\ always and all at once" is meant to realize the first stanza with the next two, while also conveying elements of a relationship that sort of moves in the same way as the poem- it starts off strong with frequent reassurances of always and forever, then is subject to a rush that strains the relationship and sort of burns it out. Like stars, which seem like always from a normal, human perspective they burn out in what ultimately amounts to have been such a short amount of time of time overall if that makes sense. Hopefully I get more comments which will give me an idea of how other people feel about this line actually conveying what I had in mind, because I am open to tweaking it and might anyway just to know you were unsure of what it was meant to convey- too much going on behind the scenes in my mind for it to have been conveyed very concisely.

1
kittenkisses•

I really like the stirring and star metaphors.You convey the point of the poem beautifully and movingly.

The line "The concept of the milky way.." is really clunky, though. The rest of it flows a lot more naturally, but that line sticks out as awkward.

And finally the last line, the leaving "lacking" light. The word lacking almost negates the whole of your poem unless I'm misinterpreting the meaning of lacking here.

But all in all I really enjoyed this! Keep it up!

1
somepoetOP•

I've made an edit to that line based on your and u/hot10trot 's replies, hopefully it reads better now- I think it does, I just cut it down to what the line originally was when I thought of this poem; I actually added more to make it clunky by accident.

Can you describe to me what you interpret to be the whole of the poem? I'm just interested in the perspective you read it in so I can address the issue you have with me having used lacking.

Thank you so much for the feedback!

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purpleit11•

I like how you took common consumables and painted them into a cosmic phenomenon. Something about the energy of a warm drink and the power of seeing it in the night sky is really lovely.

The one line that suspends my enjoyment, however, is leaving lacking light. I can appreciate alliteration but leaving lacking just seems clumsy next to each other. Try the word spilling? That could tie in the earlier use of drink and then stirring.

Also, hotter the burning. I feel this could use some reworking. Use of temperature is good, but this seems redundant. More intense the burning? with increase in heat?

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LoneUnicornZ•

Interesting concept and metaphor. I think there are a few cases where word choice is a problem: You use "sitrring/stirred" twice in two lines which is off putting, milk/milky is also used close together. I would advise using more variation in the wording. There are a couple other aspects of this piece that I find problematic. You used the pronoun "we" in the first line but the reader never knows who this "we" is. This means I have no context for the poem, you could argue you leave things vague on purpose but without the context I can't really find it in myself to relate to the piece or get a better understanding of it. I want some insight into the writer's head, how should I picture this "us." Leaving this open to interpretation is not something I would advise because it diminishes the purpose of the piece. I also wish there was some consistent structure going on. The first stanza is five lines and the rest are three, some rhyme and some don't so it makes it kind of awkward to read. I think expanding on the "we" and showing us how you're a star rather than telling us would make this a stronger poem.

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