I like to write concisely, in a way that usually involves judgments that sometimes only I can make. Knowing when writing like this works and when it doesn’t is the most important part of peer feedback to me.

Since surrealism is a style I don’t dabble in too often, getting a read on what parts were confusing in the right ways, vs. confusing in the wrong ways, was very beneficial.

My introduction I completely rewrote in order to more blatantly hint at the death of Bob. I also included more thorough descriptions of Lazlo and Bob in comparison.

The biggest change I made was in the second to last stanza where I added lines that connected to the first few stanzas. I brought back the voices and quarrels from the start, making it clear that they represent humans. I also tweaked the “And I watch,” stanza to make it flow better, changing envisionments to just visions, changing “radiating” to glimmering for an alliteration effect, and shortening the last line to keep it succinct. Lastly, I steered away from cliche at the end of the “Cut from the same cloth” line by changing what I originally had to a pause and then bringing in “But I’m afraid, you were too late” to bring back the pace of the poem.

I received feedback about the content and how to improve the direction of the story as well as give it more authenticity. I added three paragraphs to give the story more context and depth. I also changed the title of the piece.

Concision and organization were big in this piece. I knew what idea I wanted to share and the tone I wanted to use, but Angie really helped me with the overall structure and how to cut down in order to make the biggest impact.

For “hands,” I completely reworked the stanzas leading up to the last stanza. I made the purpose of the “September’s moonlight” stanza clearer, capturing the narrator’s initial uncertainty about the connection, which I then made sure to juxtapose with the rest of the poem. I also made the “enchanted” reference clearer by explicitly stating it as a song reference and adding a reason for that song reference as well. Lastly, I made the cold vs. warmth theme throughout the poem much more noticeable at the beginning to keep the poem consistent throughout.

The feedback helped me see my work from the perspective of readers and see where some word choices might be less clear or where excessive wordiness might detract from the piece.

I had a lot of positive feedback for my piece with most of the suggestions falling into the category of how to lightly tinker with the piece to bring out the best poem. I think the more general comments that I got helped me know how my poem would generally be received.

We focused a lot on voice and perspective in the piece. Since it is me talking to myself, we discussed how to make that more clear. I also wanted to play with imagery and physical description which was tough for me but very fun.

Being told what others thought I did well was really helpful during the process as it helped me see more of areas that solicited a reaction from the audience and helped me take that information and apply it to other areas that I thought could also benefit from it. Knowing where an audience wanted more details was also beneficial, as it helped me see places where I thought an audience was intrigued by or where more information was needed to help make an impact.

I received a lot of helpful feedback on the images that were working and felt vividly described. Readers also told me what they felt the central theme to the poem was, and which sections were confusing or could be written clearer.

Someone thought it might be better to know a little background information about the characters, so I tried to mention the types of missions the girls usually go on. People also asked what type of relationship they had (platonic/familial/romantic) but I decided to keep it vague on purpose.

I was told it was tight and the rhythm flowed well. There was one stanza where my syllables were inconsistent, and a few places where there was confusion on word choice such as “ones” for money and beginning the poem during a job search not in the scene most discussed. I was told that there was a lot said in a short amount of time and that my puns were effective.

I received a lot of feedback on the clarity and comprehension of my piece. The feedback mostly revolved around long sentences that could be confusing or murky in meaning. Bringing this piece in, I was very insecure that it was contrived and was also concerned because it is a style of poetry I am unfamiliar with. I got a lot of great feedback on the effectiveness of the piece, the ambiguity of the central meaning, and how its themes could be brought to the surface more.

People pointed out patterns and made connections around the idea of 2’s that I had not even considered, so getting outsiders’ perspectives like that was very valuable to my own understanding of the piece.

I received feedback on the title, which I changed from Ode to Ohio to Ode to Cleveland. I also received feedback on certain lines and their wording. Additionally, I was encouraged to play around with stanza breaks, which I tried but didn’t like.

I worked with Angie a lot on structure and punctuation. I had never written poetry before so we also worked on genre conventions and general style.

This was a self-assigned prompt, and since I had no idea of how it was/wasn’t working, getting a sense of that from the lovely folks at WG gave me helpful feedback on how to tweak my punctuation, wording, and get a sense of what flowed and what I could make more clear.