Kiss Of Death
Sat, 17 Oct 2009 at 06:14pm
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She fell in love, but not with a boy.
Though she knew, it could never work out.
She loved with a passion, so strong and deep,
That through her pain too, she felt joy.
For days she could eat nor sleep,
Because of the longing in her heart.
One kiss from her Beloved was all she desired,
To keep her happy for evermore.
One day, her father chanced upon a poem,
She'd written to the girl of her dreams.
All hell broke loose, and though she still breathed,
Her life actually ended that day.
She felt like a songbird, locked in a cage,
Trapped in the place she had called her home.
One cold, white, night, she could take it no longer,
She felt she had to leave; so she did!
Sadly, the biting cold got to her; yes, killed her,
Stiffened her limbs, froze her to her very veins!
Yet, lying there, she didn't look broken in the least:
A blissful smile played on her blue lips.
She's now in a place where she won't be hated or judged,
She's found the acceptance all humans long for.
She also finally got the kiss she so desired,
The loving, forgiving, eternal kiss; the Kiss of Death.
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s'simplistic in language and a cliche in material. love outside the expected, parental disapproval, being caged, cold death in order to escape crappy, love-deprived life. there's better stuff in you than this shit. using cliches is normally about not trusting yourself so you depend on what you've heard work before. trust yourself and do more. if you keep the plot, convince me that this was different somehow from all other unrequited romantics that died so they wouldn't have to live without reciprocity (lesbians isn't enough, especially for those who already reject the hetero-normative). convince me that this love was real, that this angst actually happened... this is so formulaic that I can't be involved in it enough to care.
thank you for being so honest. i appreciate it.
i believe you slightly misunderstood the theme of the poem.it's not romantic and i didn't try to make it romantic either...
this is actually a poem showing the sad situation of homosexuals in our society that that they consider as their release.
her love towards the other girl was young and passionate but it may or may not have lasted. i am not concerned with that, because the girl was just symbolic of all the gays and lesbians who are made victims of society simply because they aren't understood.
where you live perhaps a majority of the people have rejected "the hetero-normative" but where i live, that is not the case.
this poem is targeted to that audience who are against homosexuality. it is an attempt to appeal to them without appearing patronizing or didactic, and in a format they would be able to relate to, hence the cliche...
Perhaps I did misunderstand, but that in itself should tell you something. Poetry must stand on it's own writing, without explanation. If it doesn't, work it til it does.
Still, my problem with this is that it comes across as very trite, whether she's a lesbian or not, whether she lives in a world where homosexuals are hated or not, that's not what concerns me. If that "the girl was just symbolic of all the gays and lesbians who are made victims of society simply because they aren't understood." was your point, it's not coming across, it's buried behind the language. If you're going to have her die in the cold, compare her father's hatred to ice. Instead you've a reference to hell, generally thought to be a very warm place. Does she know her father would disapprove of her being attracted to another female? Why isn't she fearful? The songbird simile is overused everywhere and probably bases this feeling of cliche all over the poem. However, if you /are/ going to use it, extend it. Make references to birds and captivity elsewhere in the poem, wings, feathers, hope, wistfulness, prison, anything in the life cycle of a bird (molting, eggs, nest, you could even mention that some birds mate for life). As for the phrase "girl of her dreams" If you're to call her that, why not show her dreaming about her? (I'm sure you've heard the mantra "show, don't tell".) For godssake you use the word happy when you're talking of her contemplated union with someone she refers to as her Beloved. That wouldn't just make you happy, that would explode your heart. We're not even going to into the implied idea that homosexuals can only find acceptance when they die.
There's potential for a good poem here, that you have such conviction and passion as would be necessary to make it so shows in your reply to my comment. Get /that/ across to me. Make me feel it. Make me bleed with her when she dies. Make me feel ashamed for humanity that hates its daughters so. I have nothing invested in this girl because almost nothing about her is original and yet you have a message you want to get across that could be /so/ powerful.
(What we have here, sir, is a failure to communicate.)
Man, I even think it is okay to follow the clichés, provided you make 'em work FOR you. You could, rather than focussing on the individual, tie her into the overall Cycle Of the Universe or similar. Make her part of a parade of identical lovers, make her a statistic, make it clear and overt, and address, rather than this one girl, the societal tendency to generate girls like this, and why that needs to change. However, nobody likes an accidental cliché. You could probably work with the contrast between freezing and being in hell, if you wanted to keep that too. Still, the point is, very little about this poem feels deliberate right now. Your heart is clearly in the right place, and you have some interesting ideas. Now refine those choices. The skeleton is there, now add flesh!