The Last Day of Poetry Boot Camp

I just wrote my sixth poem of the week and sent it off to my fellow poetry boot campers. When I receive today's poem from my critique buddy for today, I'll email her my sixth critique of the week. Another exhilarating and exhausting poetry boot camp will be done.

I thought I'd share some of the best tidbits of critique that I received from our amazing leader, poet Molly Fisk:

On my first poem:
"In such a small poem, would it make things richer to have 'beauty' used only once and a synonym used for the second one? Twice in four lines seemed a lot - although there's nothing wrong with repeating a word, don't get me wrong - I just look carefully when I do it, so as not to be on auto-pilot and missing the chance for something new to add to the mix."

On another poem:
"My main thought is that you might play with your line breaks. Usually an especially short or long line in a poem is an indication of something: theme, or a clue to what's coming up, or something with import." My first short line in that poem, according to Molly, "doesn't deserve the attention it's getting," whereas my second one does.

On this same poem, Molly's single most dazzling insight:
"When you treat your reader as slightly smarter than you, everyone wins." She had me take out my third stanza and let the reader figure out the connection on his/her own.

And on yet another poem:
"Often when you're doing a lot of repetition, what makes the pattern seem stronger is to break it."

Wow, Molly. You are GOOD!