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7/4/2017 5:38:27 PM Andrew Walker Posts: 2	Liquid Master Drop by drop, the bottle empty's The mind and body paying the fees The cycle continues, there is no end The vapors dragging, his only friend The mind is seized, hope is but a tease hour by hour, day by day how much more, can he pay never ending, what a waste happiness is such a mild taste fear grips, so down he lay Shackled to the bar, all can see So far gone, he's blind to the key Help is there, but the bottle trips tighter and tighter the vices grip he can't go on, and he can't be free light fades and darkness grows surely this is the lowest of the lows How did he get here, servant of the drink It started so innocent, he cannot think Brandy, whiskey, gin; these are his foes Fade to black, fade away how much more, can he pay Drop by drop, the bottle empty's The mind and body paying the fees he can't see it, but he will have his day I recently started writing again, but this time I am looking to write to build a skill. I would like an honest critique on this poem. Do the rhymes seem forced? Does it have a poetic meter? Is the message cohesive and focused? Are there too many clichés? How is the grammar and punctuation? How's the title? Any comments or suggestions of your own. I would appreciate anyone who takes the time to read my poem over and let me know if I am on the right track.
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7/7/2017 2:42:12 AM Charles Henderson Posts: 7	The poem is a decent starter poem for a newbe. However you misspelled empties in line one. That turned me off at the get go. Then you drop your Capitals and your punctuation. Punctuation tells the reader when to emphasize a point and when to pause or simply stop. It is used to slow the reader down or speed up. ie: Drop by drop, the bottle empties- - - the mind and body paying the fees. The cycle continues, there is no end. The vapors dragging, his only friend. His mind is seized, hope is but a tease. Hour by hour, day by day, how much more to pay. etc, -- Chaz
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7/7/2017 1:16:56 PM Andrew Walker Posts: 2	Thank you for the feedback, Charles. I'll go back through and fix the spelling and capitalization. As far as the punctuation, I will have to read it out loud several times to myself to find the pauses and breaks.
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7/7/2017 4:27:47 PM Jerome Malenfant Posts: 26	The rhymes don't seem forced in the sense that the words don't rhyme, but in the sense that the choice of some 2nd words seems forced in order to make them rhyme with a previous word. For example: fees/tease; drink/think; pay/lay (grammatically should be 'lays'); pay/day. No comma in "how much more, can he pay", with a '?' after pay. And some lines seem awkward, ("It started so innocent, he cannot think"), probably because of point 1 above.
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7/8/2017 8:35:08 PM Bob Atkinson Posts: 294	google: poetry critic will give you some food for thought Bob Atkinson
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7/11/2017 12:45:21 AM Benjamin Varenikovich Posts: 2	there is a good rhythm to the poem, but there are a few moments where it slips, like in the beginning of the first stanza and the end of the last stanza. I really like the way you phrase things, like "happiness is such a mild taste." The second to last stanza doesn't seem to flow as well as the other ones. The phrase "lowest of the lows" is bordering on cliche a little too much for me. It also has a slower rhythm than the other stanzas, which sounds a little odd to me. It isn't a huge issue, so I'd leave it alone if you don't have a problem with it. The rhyme between foes and lows seems kind of forced. You've never referred to the bottle as his adversary before, so it seems off. The line "The cycle continues, there is no end" is redundant. As for the title, it's creative, but it doesn't seem to fit with the mood of the poem. Maybe you could name the poem something to do with dripping or drops since that image is repeated in the poem a good deal. The line "It started so innocent, he cannot think" doesn't really make sense to me, particularly the second part. It seems like you are trying to say two unrelated things at the same time, about how drinking has taken his innocence and how it is preventing him from thinking, but the way it's phrased sounds off.
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7/24/2017 7:03:52 PM Angeline Vine Posts: 3	I don't like the rhyme in this poem, though in a song I could see it. I usually prefer a free verse . The poem is sad and the reader certainly has pity for 'he' , as the subject continues to buy death (by drinking alcohol) on the installment plan. Hey that could be the title 'Death on Installment'
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