Due this week

5. Haunted. Have you ever been in a house where things go bump in the night? Do you believe that some buildings or places are haunted? Is there one in your town? Tell us a story about it. Make it believable.
Alternate: Lockers. What one thing do you wish no one to know about in your locker? Or what is the most important thing in your locker? Deadline: Friday Oct. 17.

To submit to Newspaper Series

  • Log in. (Click "Not a YWP member?" to create an account.)

  • Click "create content" and create an ENTRY
  • Fill out "title," "author name, school & grade" and "prompt" boxes.
  • Paste story into "body."
  • Click "Submit." You are done.
    NOTES: Your account email must be accurate; a "blog" entry must be resubmitted as an ENTRY to be considered.

Pieces.

XOLizaKateXO's picture
Submitted by XOLizaKateXO on April 27, 2008 - 15:31.

Lurking in the loneliest of nights,
Stalking in the depths of my eyes.
Crisp strips of moonlight gaze at me solemnly,
Lingering in the tiptops of trees.
Ghost Riders and Speer Hunters chase after their prey,
In the faint whisper of the wind.
A snake passerby hoots at and owl,
The owl replies with a hissing noise back,
And a flower lay alone in the shadow of an attack.
The shining stars follow the crows to the East,
The sun dawns again with the blue birds and the geese.
The gust of the breeze
Picks me up off my knees.
And at the dusk of the morn’,
My eyes are reborn.
Then I stumble my way back home.

i really like "and a flower

Submitted by Caitlynn on May 5, 2008 - 08:06.

i really like "and a flower lay alone in the shadow of attack" btw-i did not say "lingering in the tittops of trees" don't be so perverted, liza!

slunden's picture

UVM Mentor Comment

Submitted by slunden on May 7, 2008 - 13:33.

Hi Liza,

I really enjoyed reading your poem "Pieces." You capture well the feelings of inversion and strangeness that can occur "in the loneliest of nights": the owl hissing and the snake hooting, the flower lying in the shadow of an attack - you do a great job of grounding the bizarre in concrete images or "pieces". I also really like your rhymes, which, aside from "morn'", don't seem at all forced. I'm left wondering, though, why there's no rhyme at the beginning. If it just started happening toward the middle while you were writing, that's really fantastic - a true poetic talent. To keep this consistent, I'd go back to the beginning and see if you can't make those lines rhyme as well.
I'd also like to know more about what exactly the speaker of the poem is doing outside on her knees in the middle of the night. Those first few lines could be a great place to set this up. Although I really like the title "Pieces," because it invokes for me all these different pieces of the night, a different title might help in giving a clearer impression of the experience of the speaker.

Thanks for submitting! Great poem!
Suzanne

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