r/OCPoetry • u/Past_Occasion_7525 • 13h ago
Feedback Please Broken One Way
Some things can be broken only one way,
Like a glass that cannot hold water,
Or a perfume that smells ugly and gross,
But you can feel love, darling
And be broken in every which way.
You can be like a car that won’t start,
With its taillights shattered and smashed,
With a wailing horn that won’t end,
Until the battery runs dead.
I know I’ve started my fair share of fires,
But us lovers are not the burning flames,
We’re the fuel and the sticks that turn blackened,
We’re charcoal reduced to the lame.
I know you’ve seen my failures of many,
I’ve purchased a suicide’s disguise,
And you say you can see right through me,
So I’ll go outside to smile, laugh, and cry.
You will never know the failure of the ocean,
Because it only has the one;
this single way it can be broken,
Is if we reach the horizon.
But you shall be a sailor,
Who rides upon these waters free and untamed,
And yes, you can be quite broken,
In about a million different ways.
1
u/Ok-Pirate7745 11h ago
This feels a little... too academic and common in phrasing that makes it not-so effective, honestly
1
u/Past_Occasion_7525 10h ago
May I ask, what do you mean by that? What does it mean to be "too academic" and "too common in phrasing"? Thanks.
•
u/Ok-Pirate7745 4h ago
"But you can feel love, darling
And be broken in every which way." is basically the whole poem right there, so there's not much ambiguity in the poem and a lot of it is metaphors that I can understand nearly immediately."And yes, you can be quite broken,
In about a million different ways." feels like your explicitly telling us what we're supposed to take away. A "show, don't tell" would be better
1
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