Poem Criticism

[Babar]

I generally dislike writing serious poetry, it usually sounds pretentious and snotty, and shows my lack of skill all too openly, so I have no idea how this got here. I realise that I've mixed up too much of "Ye Olde English" with "Yo, not so old English", and I've placed too much importance on rhyming. Any help would be appreciated:


A stone with which my life compared:
The uselessness that both have fared.

I gaze, I gape, my maw awide,
My usefulness and stone's: Denied.

He drones on, building word on word,
His simile, my wrath incurred,
I tune out, his voice just in background sense,
Unbeknownst to him, I take offense.

I stare at it: this useless stone,
It's characters like mine alone,
A double life it lives throughout,
One hidden, under; One open, out.

I muse to myself: If this stone was not,
Would it, in a flash, be forgot?

I tune back to find no background sound,
His voice is gone, he's not around.
I rise, and stand above my twin,
I pull it out, and look within.

A horde of insects I find inside,
A horde my stone was meant to hide.
They run around, annoyed, distressed,
I replace the stone as I see best.

The stones secret has been kept awhile.
"As useless as the stone" - I smile.

[Babar]

As troublesome as it may be to criticise poetry, I wasn't kidding when I said I'd like some help. Come on? Please?

[MarVelo]

Poop in your pants  8)     

[Ginny]

Ok, I'll give it a shot:

A stone with which my life compared:
The uselessness that both have fared.

I gaze, I gape, my maw awide,
My usefulness and stone's: Denied.

These lines seem problematic to me, especcially the last one (the "denied" part).

He drones on, building word on word,
His simile, my wrath incurred,
I tune out, his voice just in background sense,
Unbeknownst to him, I take offense.

It seems like this means that you (or the speaker) have been offended by the words of someone, and "tune out", now only hearing them in the background? If so, it took me several rereads the understand that. I think "background sense" is the problematic phrase.

I stare at it: this useless stone,
It's characters like mine alone,
A double life it lives throughout,
One hidden, under; One open, out.

Love this verse. "Its characters like mine alone".

I muse to myself: If this stone was not,
Would it, in a flash, be forgot?

I think there's a problem with the rhyming here. I'd suggest "Would it, so quickly, be forgot?" or "Would it, quite quickly, be forgot?". It seems to sound better.

I tune back to find no background sound,
His voice is gone, he's not around.
I rise, and stand above my twin,
I pull it out, and look within.

A horde of insects I find inside,
A horde my stone was meant to hide.
They run around, annoyed, distressed,
I replace the stone as I see best.

The stones secret has been kept awhile.
"As useless as the stone" - I smile.

Last 3 verses - gold. I really like them, and they brought a smile to my lips.

Actually, after some rereading while I was writing this, the first verses make some more sense.

There were some minor typos/punctuation errors. I could point them out, but I think you can find them yourself.

[Paper Carnival]

It's really hard to critisise poetry... But I'll try to:

I have trouble understanding the meaning. I don't have anything against it, it'quite cool and my kind of stuff. But what does the stone symbolise?

I spotted some mistakes (at least I think they are mistakes).
A stone with which my life was/is compared
Its character's like mine alone (?)
Would it, in a flash, be forgotten?
Maybe there are more, but that's all I could find so far

[ManicMatt]

A stone with which my life was/is compared

Would it, in a flash, be forgotten?

Sure sure, but I would have thought these two were intentional?

I like the poem anyway, and I like it in some literature that the topic is open to interpretation as to what it's about.

[FrogMarch]

I really like it. My interpretation of it is that you've felt restricted by someone, but now that they've gone you're free to express yourself and be the person you want to be.

There's a few problems caused maybe by confusing grammar, and some more by the rhyming... but I only like poems that rhyme, so it's worth it!

I like the whole stone metaphor, personification and imagery. It conjured up loads of cool ideas and seemed really graphic to me. Overall, really great!

[Andail]

I think it's too full of pompous and archaic words, and the whole thing makes me think of Poe.
Not that I don't love Poe, but he was active a long time ago. As contemporary youth poetry, this doesn't strike me as very honest, more like you're trying to impress on someone.

When you go for this old-fashioned Poe-ish stuff, people will start to scrutinize the rhymes and verse-meter, and in this case there are too many flaws, simply.
If you had gone for free verse and more mundane language, people would focus on the message instead.

[big brother]

I haven't read them too closely, but the AA BB rhyming scheme makes it sound like it's a children's poem or song lyrics. If this is your intention, then great, I just thought I'd point it out in case you're not aware of it.