Fire

[Helga]

something I needed to get of my chest


Looking back on our nights together
I want to remember them all
The first time you kissed me
The first time you touched me
When I hoped you would never let go

A small devil came and took you away
I hoped you would find your way back
Thinking of you most of my days
‘till I heard your name said out loud
‘the young man who was killed in the fire’
The young man that was my first love

I wish I could take all those years back
And never stray from your side
I wish I could touch your hair again
I wish I could look in your eyes again
I know I would only see a fool
In your eyes I would see my reflection
A fool looking at you

It finally hit me, I know you are gone
I know I won’t see you again

You were my lover
You were my friend

When I found you again you were gone.

[TheFifthElement]

Helga, this is beautiful and terribly sad. Lovely poetry for a terrible event. I hope it helps with your grief.

[PrinceMyshkin]

What a heartfelt poem, all the more touching for its simple directness.

[blank|verse]

When I found you again you were gone.

*Crash!* Falls off chair; picks himself up...

Ouch. That's painfully beautiful. A real line of poetry. Well done.

The poem is obviously autobiographical, so you have my sympathies; I'll try and concentrate on the poetry here.

What makes that line so effective is the brilliant congruence of form and content. The tone is understated and suggests a barely expressible anguish that is underlined by the use of simple, largely monosyllabic words. It carries all the more emotional weight and impact because of what it doesn't say. There's such brevity and concision; it's so stark and honest.

It's also a line of anapaestic trimeter, if you realised or not. Ie:

When I FOUND you a-GAIN you were GONE
- - / - - / - - /

two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed one. It's such a great line, and the rhythm here really makes it sing. This is the reason I get frustrated with people who don't want to use metre or rhythm in their work - read, hear, feel why this is such a strong line and so much better because it uses technique. Lines like this are the reason we write poetry.

Unfortunately, it's so good, it kind of overshadows the rest of the poem. You may not want to change a word now, after it's written, and that's understandable; but if you were to try to shorten it, and place greater stress on the last line, and possibly introduce echoes of it in previous lines, you could make a very good poem an outstanding one.

Thank you for sharing it.

[Helga]

thanks guys

this was just something I wrote in haste when I came back from the funeral

but thank you for your words

[blazeofglory]

This poem is so penetrating it resounded for a long time and this reflects exactly what goes with a person deeply tormented when he or she has to part with someone deeply close

[MorpheusSandman]

Ditto to what FifthElement and Prince said.