Poetry anyone?

[restrictment]

Have any of you just felt like expressing your feelings through text in the most efficient way possible? Well Poetry can usually satisfy that urge. So post them here, and comment on the ones you would like.

I myself am not a writer or anything close to that, but I decided to give it a shot. Please tell me what you think, thanks!:

Love Life

I saw you sitting there, lonely and dark,
Opened up to you and began to ignite the spark.

Our lives began to slowly unravel,
Not knowing where our love would travel.

The time spent together went by so fast,
Vanquishing the dark hand of our past.

I did my best to help you,
Love you and caress you.

The angel of love was not so lenient,
I was left feeling unpleasant and deviant.

I was always there for you, but you killed my pride.
So upset that I nearly died..

P.S. The poem does mean a lot to me, and it truly did come from my heartbreaking experiences..so please go easy on me! =]

[jon.kiparsky]

Criticizing amateur poetry is too much like shooting ducks in a barrel. Anything I could say about this particular poem would tend to discourage you from writing more, which I don't want to do.
So instead, some advice from a non-poet:

Thank you for working metrically - non-metrical poetry is (in my never-humble opinion) generally bad prose with badly-placed line breaks. You need practice with it, though. Write more poems. Try to use the meter, instead of letting it use you. Read Poe - notice how you can read his lines in a perfectly natural tone, and the meter simply pushes the words along.

Read more poems, and try to plagiarize the style of poets you admire - pick a poem that you love, and borrow its voice. Repeat as necessary.

Put yourself in the head of someone you aren't, and try to get at their experience. Listen to Bruce Springsteen sing "State Trooper" - or almost anything! - and remember that he was never any of those people. Poetry doesn't have to be about your own situation, and often it's better if you can get outside of yourself to write it. Or did Frost have to scribble down "Stopping By the Woods" sitting in a horse-drawn sleigh in front of a neighbor's woodlot, in the dead of a New England winter? Try to tell the story that inspired the poem above, from her point of view. If you can do that honestly, you'll have learned something.

Again, write a lot: I used to play bass for a very good songwriter, and he told me he would write ten songs for each one he ended up keeping, but he would finish each and every one of them, because he never knew which one would end up being the keeper. Try to learn something from him - what ended up in his songs was excellent.

There you go. Tons of free advice. Worth every penny you paid for it. Hope something in there helps.

I'm crap at poetry, but here goes:

I saw you sitting there, like an old hag,
Opened you up and began to light a fag.

Our entrails began to slowly unravel,
Knot in my stomach and my navel.

The time quickly goes as we fall apart,
Vanquishing the silence with a sigh and a fart.

I did my best to help you,
But couldn't help but spew.

The angel of depravity was not so lenient,
I was left feeling wet and deviant.

I always had a thing for you, but you spliced my pride.
So cut up that I nearly died..

How'd I do? I was inspired. Thanks restrictment. It's opened up a whole new range of possibilities for me.