Forgotten sons

This poem highlights the plight of the boychild in today's world. It is a call to pay more attention to the boychild and contribute to their wellbeing.

 

They said, “Be strong, you’re just a boy,”
But strength was all I ever knew.
No arms reached out when the nights grew long,
Just concrete beds and skies turned blue.

They built their walls for girlhood’s rise,
And rightly so�"but what of me?
A child too young to hide his cries,
Too old to ask to just be free.

I ran with boys whose names were lost,
To streets that bit with hunger’s teeth.
We made our homes from broken crates,
We learned to beg, to lie, to breathe.

The world passed by with turned-up coats,
Eyes fixed on phones, on pride, on speed.
No one asked why boys fall first�"
Just blamed us for the things we need.

But I remember lullabies�"
Faint echoes buried in my chest.
Before the cold, before the guns,
Before I learned to fake my rest.

I am not steel, I am not stone.
My silence isn’t peace, it’s pain.
I’m just a boy who should have grown
In soil not soaked with cold and rain.

Reviews

[JayG]

I see some problems you need to address.

The first is that you’re far too often forcing the line’s meaning to your need to rhyme. And that always detracts.

As an example, in Stanza 1 line 3, you speak of nights. But in L4, you link concrete beds to skies of blue at night, when the sky is black black? But because you needed a rhyme for S1L2, which ends in “knew”...

And too often, because you have context and intent driving your understanding, you fail to provide it for the reader.

In S2 you told the reader that the speaker is female, and “ran with boys.” But then, based on that, what meaning can the reader take from, “boys fall first?” Fall in what sense? Clumsiness? Attacks on them for unknown reasons by undefined assailants? You know. The speaker knows. Even the "boys" know. The reader? No idea.

And you follow that with, “Just blamed us for the things we need.”

Is that “us” as in the boys she ran with? The females blamed for the boy’s falling? As in... And who are the undefined "we?"

Again, you know. The people you talk about know. The reader? Without context it’s meaningless.

And finally. The rhyme in any poem is an accent, not the purpose, and should support, not dictate meaning. But more than that, metrical poetry has a fixed structure. You, though, change your rhyming approach by stazna, as a matter of convenience:

S1= ABCB
S2= ABAB
S3= ABCD
S4= ABCB
S5= ABAB

My point: There’s lots to writing poetry that’s not obvious, but necessary. So it makes a lot of sense to dig into the skills that have been perfected over more than a thousand years.

My personal suggestion is:

For metrical Poetry, read the excerpt from Stephen Fry’s The Ode Less Traveled.

For prose poetry, Mary Oliver’s A Poetry Handbook is a must. It’s a fun read, and filled with gems of knowledge.

Sorry my news isn’t better, But since you, as author, have full context as you read, the problems are invisible to you. So, since the problem is one of missing knowledge, not talent, I thought you might want to know.

[Davidgeo]

The marathon of pretentiousness we call Jay G still continues.

[JayG]

Not being a real poet, you'd be expected to misunderstand, child.

[Davidgeo]

Ha, my dude... saying s**t like that, it just exposes you. You are driven by anger and the need to talk down to people. It's pathetic to be still doing that s**t at your age.

[Davidgeo]

Also, you have a wikipedia understanding of writing. You don't actually understand what it is you are talking about.

[Davidgeo]

My personal suggestion is and always will be... shut the f**k up and let people explore their interest in the craft. C**t face.