Exhales

What a beautifully sad poem by Kakera this week!
I was locked in from start to finish. It's very hard to pour sorrow onto paper and transform it into true elegance, and Kakera did that with this piece.
I really admire the repetition lines in this poem:

"And when I did,
I wept endlessly"

and

"To all of you whom"

Kakera used these lines in repeat form and that added a nice touch to this sorrow based piece, however my only critique would be that whom was used in the first stanza and "who" was used in the following stanzas... which through me off a tiny pit.
I won't dive in too much on the message of this poem, I feel it speaks for itself and very tastefully expressed. Pain and sadness; Written in a breathtaking poem.. left me speechless at the end of reading.

Judging comment:

I like how immediately, the author is reaching out to a specific audience, those whom the sunlight reaches. Those who may be hopeful enough to see a purpose in their lives or those who are already finding happiness in life. I find rhythm in this piece and also a smooth transition between stanzas... from feeling trapped to even having self-destructive thoughts. The idea of rebuilding the stars in one's own sky, having control, stands out to me as we all may wish to do that at times if we feel our lives have become too vulnerable. Then the third stanza speaks profoundly about love and how love has reached the author, yet that desire to keep it, like its sacred, has exhausted the mind and heart. Some of the most emotional lines are here:

"It took all of my hate to balance it out
when my exhales became hurricanes
of lovely sadness that killed our faith,"

Very well-written and I think the repetition of "And when I did, I wept endlessly" (with the slight change to when it did, mentioning sadness) has a certain conclusiveness, that this is where the author can hope no more. (7)

Wow is all I can say! I've read this multiple times and it is still the only thing that I can say each time, but this time I do believe I will try to conjure up a somewhat decent comment. :)

First of all, Congratulations! You completely deserved to be on the front page with this poem. It is breathtaking!

The first stanza describes the darkness that surrounds you; negative thoughts and feelings about yourself continue to bury you deeper and deeper. You destroy any ray of sunlight (happiness) before it has a chance to light your world too much because it scares you. Darkness is comfortable, so sometimes it is just better to stay there.

I really liked the rebuilding part. You have the power to destroy yourself, but you like it due to the fact that no matter what,you can always rebuild. It isn't the end...and to me, that showcases strength and hope.

The second stanza recognizes beauty. It focuses on your internal feelings towards yourself. You reject any form of beauty and use it as a weapon against yourself, degrading yourself with your own words.

The third stanza speaks of love. At first, I thought it was speaking of heartbreak and about someone that you gave your all to has crushed everything you ever had. However, after reading it several times, I think it means that it was self-destructing love. It was something good in your life, however you felt like you didn't deserve to be loved, so you destroyed any chance of it ever being anything but pain.

I absolutely adore the repetition throughout the whole poem, it adds a depth of emotion that really hits the readers hard. It showcases that throughout it all.. sunlight, beauty and love, you still wept. The self-destruction is definitely felt throughout this entire piece and it broke my heart at times and at other times, I could completely relate.

Wonderful piece and I'm truly glad this is on the front page, it does PnQ justice. <3

This poem is so touching and deep, it really hits home for me.

I always like poetry where the author starts out asking a question, because straight away it forced the reader to be involved as the mind answers the question. I can say I related to your first verse very much and knew exactly what you were describing. it was very honest in how you struggle in the darkness, yet know the darkness is caused by your own thoughts. I think we are all guilty of this, some perhaps more than others.

I really think the repetition worked wonders here, really stood out and by the end I was expecting it to be there, like the chorus of a song. Thee would make such powerful lyrics.

Really powerful poem, congrats on the win. ...p.s, great title choice.

Repetitive format makes for a good structure for the poem itself is dripping with irony and pathos. Sunlight, beauty and love: you develop a cosmos from the universal active force, light, to the universal passive force, beauty; you cap them with the yin-yang flow of love.
How do you fit in? With light you deconstruct and rebuild your world. I have an idea that the sorrow resultant is unavoidable. Beauty you reject, absorbing it as a destructive force, contra-romantic, and devise weapons perhaps to preserve your solitude. Is the pain because you do not feel capable of accepting goodness? The question is resolved by love, which so destroys your "self" that it takes all your power to escape its clutches. Here, the sadness, the anguish, is for love's labors lost.