Source
r/poetry_critics•
Metamorphis

Cronch!

"Cronch, cronch, CRONCH!"

The sound of wet snow turned sludge dripping out of your chewy disgusting mouth makes my dormant butterflies vomit their own set of daggers.

Your whispering of blizzardy emotions along with fluent bodily movements torture animalistic instincts. Each flirtatious hits' vile imprint from a mutually bored misfit, with bonus tidbits, gets consciously toned to be ignored, for sure! This wretched image of Amor restore my sense of livid interest like a chore. But that's my limit at its core.

Her volatile heroic wars seamstress meets the lord of compassionate stoic hindrance. Together we mask ourselves in the blood of past mistakes for a new dawn, in the same land we've trudged through so many times before. It's on!

We adore paths rooted in cold fragmented memories of others as each step seem new and astonishing - on locations where lies turn promising. Hopefully the weather will be better now that we've laid the winter behind us. Guided by our wits craze as the right play, we move ahead.

Or perhaps I'm walking straight into an ice age.

In which case, I'll break apart a glaciers spear, and shut that frozen pop-quiz between my teeth before my next upcoming date on a hot summer day. Then open up with:

"Cronch,
cronch,
cronch..."

Posted Nov 14, 2020, 12:14 PM UTC · edited

1210
ShjoddyBeginner•

Is this meant to be performed and not read? Spoken word style poetry? Either way, the first two stanzas read like you just found a thesaurus and shook it until a pile of complicated-sounding words fell out, which you then glued together without much thought as to how it is for a reader to wade through them all. Not good.

Drop either 'chewy' or 'disgusting' from the first stanza. Having both of them there serves to reinforce the disgust you're feeling, but it is detrimental to the poem because you are saying the same thing twice and it pulls me out of the flow because I notice that needless repetition and am annoyed.

Honestly the second stanza reads like you took a not-very-good bot and made it procedurally generate a poem. I don't think it works well at all.

4
MetamorphisOPBeginner•

I've put a lot of thought behind the use of each word, they're not just randomly placed. Either you relate to it, or you don't. Some parts could probably be improved upon though, that I can agree with. I'm coming from a hiphop/rap background transitioning into slam poetry now

1
gerkin123Expert•

Hello.

I'm noticing that you rely heavily on adjectives in this piece, and you're laying them in succession without commas. This is a bit problematic in a grammatical sense, and I cannot see a particular reason for skipping the step. For instance, you write "Her volatile heroic wars" rather than "her volatile, heroic wars" and "compassionate stoic hindrance" instead of "compassionate, stoic hindrance."

I'll also note that these choices seem a bit patchwork or disconnected... As a reader, I appreciate having to interpret meaning, but I just don't follow much of the abstraction here. The writing is circumnavigating meaning, and if it were written more tightly, I might appreciate the puzzle.

3
MetamorphisOPBeginner•

This is the kinda feedback I was looking for. The words I used wasn't random or used just to "seem smart", there's a reason for them. I could have polished it a bit further to get effect I was looking for that you're touching on though. Going to see what I can do about that

1
Hydwyn•

I like how you use internal rhyme. It sounds like you’re shoving loads of fancy words in to sound clever though. This makes it feel pretty amateurish. Cull your words. Your poem should be as absolutely short as humanly possible.

1
MetamorphisOPBeginner•

I'm not sure if I agree with "poem should be as absolutely short as humanly possible" but I definitely see where you're coming from and will keep it in mind. Each words is placed with care, I can explain it to you if you want. Thanks for reading and giving your thoughts

1
Hydwyn•

It can be 10 words or 10,000 words, as long as you think you NEED those words to convey the point. Every word should be under scrutiny as to whether it adds anything. E.g “before my next upcoming date” - next and upcoming mean the same thing so one of them can be cut

2
MetamorphisOPBeginner•

I see what you're saying, beautiful example. Thanks for pointing it out. I wanted to highlight that it's only connected to the next date I'm going on, not necessarily dates set after that one as emotions can change after the first. I guess upcoming is unnecessary after all. I see the fault in my use there, still a bit on edge with "chewy disgusting" as I think it adds to the nauseating feeling and want to highlight it. You got anything as to why it doesn't create the effect I want or is excessive?

I do want to write towards poetry slam events in the future if that matters. Would appreciate your input on anything else you see as well. Appreciate it a lot with you taking the time to explain things to me as well, I'm definitely a slow learner so this means a lot to me

1
Hydwyn•

“Chewy disgusting” doesn’t flow for me very well as there’s no internal rhyme or similar sounds going on: the word “chewy” is soft sounding and short whereas “disgusting” is longer and harder sounding. This can work, I just don’t feel it does here. I’d say if you want something to be disgusting then show that it is rather than tell me. Also “chewy disgusting mouth” is odd... how can a mouth be chewy? It can chew. But is it chewy? Similarly, is a mouth disgusting? In the line starting, “Her volatile...” what is going on? Should there be an apostrophe in wars? Does the war own the seamstress or are there multiple wars?

In terms of slam I can see that, but you’re generally speaking quite quickly (I know not always), so the listener needs to understand what you’re talking about. I think the line starting “we adore paths...” is really good and that’s generally because it’s not as wordy (although I don’t get the meaning if I’m honest). It works because of the sounds at the start, middle or end of each word. FragMented Memories oF oTHerS (f and th sound similar) aS each Step SeemS new and aStoniSHing - on locaTIONS where lieS turn promiSing. I’ve capitalised the similar sounds and why I think it works well - I don’t know if you’ve consciously aimed for these sounds or whether it sounded “right” when you were writing it.

I’d say, next time you write, keep it simple to understand conceptually, short and focused on one or two sounds so you can practise this specifically. Read it out and think about the sounds and shapes your mouth makes.

2