This is such a clever poem!!! Your imagery is phenomenal on every single line and really gives the impression of how toxic the scene that you're describing is. Also, how normal it is for the people in the poem. You describe their mundane every day activities like they've adapted to the toxic environment around them, which is a great way to bring up the issue of not caring about our environment. Your rhyming scheme was very pleasant and easy to follow with your rhythms. Well done!!!

I appreciate your amendment to the original. After saying it out loud, with and without the change you suggested, I can hear the difference. I'll keep this in mind as I draft my next work, as I tend to use lot's of *but's, a's* and *so's* unnecessarily. Thanks for the feedback!

Like a painting of the Yamuna river. The world doesnt have enough poetry of the tragically gross.

The syllable count is entirely up to you. But an offer to consider since it doesnt change the meaning at all

"developed a bitter taste"

Or 

"developed bitter taste"?

Way to describe such a malignant waste land in which we live


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Greetings! 

Down-river indeed. I much appreciate you designating each of the different descriptors of toxicity to each of the different outcomes of manmade environmental pollution. It is a full cycle in the end. 

One thing I'd like to possibly direct your attention to is tense consistency. Perhaps in staying the present tense throughout would amplify that despite the grotesqueness, it is happening now (literally or metaphorically). You do shift to the present tense towards the end. Intended? Not sure. Maybe switching to the past tense at the end would make it more gloomy. 

Many men yearn(ed) for a cleansing dip. 

Some souls jump(ed) in, and some souls slip(ped).

However, if you do switch to present, some lines will stand at a -1 syllable count. 

Well done and write on!

 

The river throbbed with a waste so vile,

At the banks it frothed with thick acidic bile.

Geysers doused birds in steaming toxic waste,

And the fruit of nearby trees developed a bitter taste.

Leaves evaporated in the noxious haze,

While the sky above plants erupted in a blaze.

Children made shapes in the sludge on the sand,

Showing no regard for the shape of their hands.

Preachers condemned the water they baptized in,

And sacrificed animals rotted from within.

Many men yearn for a cleansing dip.

Some souls jump in, and some souls slip.

&amp;#x200B;

 

[https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/yh4isz/what\_i\_leave\_behind/iuc6zd6/?context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/yh4isz/what_i_leave_behind/iuc6zd6/?context=3)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/yg6aon/as\_i\_watch\_a\_stranger\_gag\_on\_a\_penis\_that\_isnt/iu7ggby/?context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/yg6aon/as_i_watch_a_stranger_gag_on_a_penis_that_isnt/iu7ggby/?context=3)