Comment from rama devi

Excellent

Powerful and impacting! I love the use of repetition and the musical flow of phrases. This is extremely relevant at the moment. Hope it wakes people up to action!

My only suggestion is to consider not capping each line (though it is perfectly acceptable to keep all caps if you prefer). Since the flow is fluid enjambment read aloud, it would be nice if it visually gave the clue to readers that it is one sentence, For example, here:



The faces in the crowd
In the snow
White stillness, stare
Without speaking about
What just happened
Until


reads smoother (to me) with only one cap:


The faces in the crowd
in the snow
white stillness, stare
without speaking about
what just happened
until


Love the crescendo effect in first stanza--drew me in.


Brrr~


Potent poem. Memorable.

Warmly, rd

 Comment Written 13-Jan-2017

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reply by the author on 13-Jan-2017

Thanks for your five star review and your suggestions. I am a traditionalist, I guess, but I see your point. Maybe the flow is better that way. but everyone reads things their own way, I guess. this went through several rewrites. I am never happy with things, never able to just leave them on the shelf. a perfectionist. estory

reply by rama devi on 13-Jan-2017

The old style is to cap all lines and it is perfectly fine to use it! Warm Smiles, rd

Comment from Irish Rain

Excellent

So true. Are we frozen in fear, immune because what we see is so common on TV, or do we just not care? People are becoming very detached it seems...'not my problem'...it's always everyone's problem when that attitude reigns. Great poem, blessings...

 Comment Written 08-Jan-2017

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reply by the author on 09-Jan-2017

thanks for the five stars and your encouraging comments. glad you read and enjoyed. estory

Comment from Bill Schott

Excellent

This poem, Cold, speaks volumes about the ever increasing distance we put between each other as we become more and more insular to society.

 Comment Written 07-Jan-2017

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reply by the author on 08-Jan-2017

Thanks for the five stars and your positive remarks. this is a poem about witnessing something happening to someone, and remaining silent. there is a weight of responsibility we all bear, and I thought it was heavy and cold, like snow. poetry wise, I tried to work elements of minimalism, repeating words and patterns, into a tight, tense structure estory

Comment from winnona

Excellent

A well-written poem. The silence in society, today when something bad happens to an individual ,continues to be a very bad problem. As the old saying goes. All it takes is for good men to do nothing.

 Comment Written 07-Jan-2017

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reply by the author on 08-Jan-2017

Thanks for your five star review and your comments. I hope this experiment with minimalism in free verse worked. estory

Comment from mvbrooks

Excellent

I've read a few poems on this site where people write of the negative aspects of snow. Of being frozen or living in a frozen place for too many months.

While your poem also offers the starkness of snow or winter, it also goes beyond to offer the starkness of life when people pass each other without any acknowledgment.

The finishing line: "Without saying anything" seems to mirror those moments when we pass without leaving anything behind.

 Comment Written 07-Jan-2017

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reply by the author on 08-Jan-2017

Thanks for your five star review and your comments. You got exactly what I was trying to do. the snow is a metaphore here for silence. and the last line hangs in the air like frost, as the final word on the subject. I guess this worked. estory

Comment from Drew Delaney

Excellent

This is very well done. It sounds like a terrible tragedy has occurred and people are just staring blankly into oblivion. But it's so cold, and nothing is being said. When something like that happens, we tend to worry about making things worse. Sometimes our words are our worst enemy. Like work! Drew

 Comment Written 07-Jan-2017

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reply by the author on 08-Jan-2017

Thanks for the five stars and your interesting comments. this is an angle I hadn't thought of; maybe sometimes we don't say anything because we are afraid of saying the wrong thing. this is what I look for in reviews. well, its too late to work it into this poem for now, but it is something to consider when writing another one on this subject, or reworking it. otherwise I think you got what I was trying to do estory

Comment from mbroyles2

Excellent

I enjoyed this poem a lot. It uses vivid imagery to deliver a strong message.
"White stillness, stare
Without speaking"
Really good!
Michael

 Comment Written 07-Jan-2017

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reply by the author on 08-Jan-2017

Thanks for your five star review and your encouraging comments. these dramatic pauses worked I guess. spent some time and effort rewriting this to come up with the exact alliterations and patterns I wanted estory

Comment from Marykelly

Excellent

This poem has more suggestion than statement and its strength to me is the mood it creates. The people are colder than snow which says they are almost without humanity. There's an implied incident that no one reacts to and therefore the people present are colder than snow.

 Comment Written 07-Jan-2017

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reply by the author on 08-Jan-2017

Thanks for the five stars and your comments. you got this metaphore exactly, and the poem is deliberately ambiguous to make it open to almost anyone's experience. we have all been in situations like this, and they are happening all around all the time. it is an unresolved experience of life. so this poem is unresolved. that's life, for better, or in this case, worse estory

Comment from Cindy Warren

Excellent

I know. When it's one on one, people will help, but when there's a crowd they all want to leave it for somebody else. I hope you've raised some awareness.

 Comment Written 07-Jan-2017

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reply by the author on 08-Jan-2017

Thanks for the five stars and your encouraging comments. I am trying to capture in a form an experience that resonates in all our lives. another angle I hadn't thought of, we sometimes wait for someone else to step in; kind of like pointing the finger around the circle. but I think its good that the poem was ambiguous enough to open up inside of other people and mean different things, take a life of its own. that to me, is good poetry estory