You caught my attention with your very first two lines. The word "lay" is so calm, so unthreatening. Without scrolling down, one might imagine that what is being described is a simple act of comfortable sex. But then ...."the nerve to close your eyes". Now I know there's something coming. How can I be impartial in this review. Already I feel the cool chill forcing my skin to dimple with goose bumps. I see the blood on the sink .... and those cold tiles against my own forehead. Perhaps only a ...

What I find particularly striking is your meticulous eye for those ordinary details of a workman's lunch which evoke a really strong sense of the reader actually being "in" the poem. It's a strong atmospheric effect which carries right through the entire poem. "Upended bucketseat" set the scene with the men launching into an opening topic of who's boy is playing good ball and details of the latest work accident. The details of the food with "storebought tortillas not measuring up to those fro...

A quite astonishingly sensitive and well written piece by someone so young. You had my attention with your opening sentence ... 'Sometimes, when you lose someone, life kinda blurs on you ." The slang "kinda" is a perfect fit. I know I'm going to empathize with the speaker. And your follow up sentence ... "this unrecognizable mess that didn't hurt, didn't bug me ... it just didn't do anything" is bleak and compelling. The third paragraph slips only because the scene at the studio isn't clearly...

Many years ago, one of my best teachers warned me that to write strong poetry, I should avoid descriptive words ... emotional words such a "chaos" or "remorse" or "regret". In order to convey emotion, I should choose concrete words. We battled long and hard over this, until I understood the concept. Poetry is rather like condensed prose .... a great deal of emotion ... or a deep thought .. encapsulated by a restricted number of words. Unless of course you want to replicate "Inferno". So I wou...

Without the necessary "background info" regarding this mini piece, it would seem somewhat frivolous. But as part of an editor's project, it makes more sense. However to my mind there are two ways to approach this quite difficult literary problem. One, the more onerous, it to coin a classic phrase such as the original inspiration ... "Brevity is the Soul of Wit". That is a general statement and very effective. This is the path you chose. The other is to narrow the focus down to the more indiv...

This one packs a punch! The obvious double standard of the sacrificial wine, a substance with alcoholic content, being reverently consumed in Church, whilst a nip of brandy from a hip flask would obviously have the worshipper excorted to the doors .... is trenchent, telling and witty .... I love it! This short phrase brings up many thought on 'religious claptrap" which have haunted me for most of my life. The Bible is replete with references to wine. Not perjorative references ... just ordina...

Admittedly this assignment .... to create a "story" in six words, is a horrendously difficult one. Papa Hemmingway's "Baby shoes, never worn, for sale" could be the gold standard for this genre. In a few words, one understands a life tragedy ... the death of a baby. However this "short story" labors under vague words like "beauty" and "self", which dilute its strength. With such limitations on length ... a conciseness required by poetry as well ... the writer or poet must be very careful to a...

An odd coincidence here. I trained as a concert pianist, with a degree from Juilliard until a nervous breakdown deprived me of the ability to memorize the music ... and thus brought my career to an end. So I do recognize those "ten soldiers" .... I also empathize with the performer playing for himself .... which is what we do in the most intense moments of our performance. But as poetry, this doesn't work for me. One must recognize the fact that the symbolism and details will be lost to the ...

I like this one! Terse and carrying a message. It is a apt artist's statement. And confirms that the writer is an artist. Good!

Yep .... this is a winner. For all of us who've lost a masterpiece at that crucial moment when the computer gangs up on us, this is familiar. Terrific use of the six words .... witty and trenchant.