When the wind stops

[Todd]

Hi Rookie, welcome to the site! A few brief comments:

I like the cadence and the rhythm of the shorter lines you seem to have a natural feel for it. There are a few bumps that you should catch if you read it out loud. The first two strophes work the best.

Minor issues: L4 to would probably work better than a.

Major issue: I don't think the longer lines work well in the poem. There are too many adverbs and adjectives weighing the lines down. They feel overwritten and not nearly as cool and good as your shorter lines.

L11: minor typo arsonist.

Just my thoughts.

Best,

Todd

Wow thanks for the quick and effective feedback I thought the structure of the longer lines would add to the effect of chaos and instability relative to the calmness of the shorter lines. At the same time, portray the climax of a bipolar calm-chaos-calm breakdown.

Here's the weird thing. And it may be just me as a reader. Shorter lines are read faster and increase the pace of a poem. Longer lines go slower and tend to read more calm. You might be using the wrong line length to do what you want...like using a hammer to pound bolts instead of a wrench. The content of your shorter lines fits with a calming mood but the pace we read them at works against calm. The content your reaching for with the longer lines may express more destructiveness but the form of them doesn't aid the goal in my opinion...if that makes any sense.