Some of my feedback focused on the last line: “I would’ve not longed for her to meet.” When the tutor read this out loud, they read it as “I would not have longed for her to meet” instead. When I pointed it out, we discussed a few options, but the concept of making something tough to read makes the reader take it slow and use more cognitive processing. That might be frustrating in long paragraphs but in these short lines I think it actually helps the reader to be cautious of what they are reading.

The reviewer at the writing center said she would like to see another line in my poetry referencing a mythical beast. I decided not to insert a side story of what I only intended to be a singular comparison of a mythical, multifaceted being in dramatic contrast to the two sidedness of being disabled. I also want readers to understand it’s a passing thought of comparison and not a direct analogy.

The things I needed to change had a lot to do with how the piece reads out loud vs. on the page. I had to slow down some parts in structural ways, since I wouldn’t be able to control the speed of the reader. This meant adding more single sentence breaks in between longer paragraphs, a suggestion that I really appreciated and ended up enhancing the piece a lot.

I received feedback on clarifying the poem’s meaning, specifically the interpretation of the speaker’s thoughts. The poem focuses on a speaker observing a rainy day; my original draft focused heavily on the imagery of the poem, but was more “show” than “tell” as the speaker described the changing of the clouds from soft, lamb-like forms to lion-esque creatures. The writing center tutor recognized this idea, but was not sure if the speaker was in awe or fear. After looking at the poem again, I agreed with this feedback.

One specific suggestion I was given was to perhaps add roman numerals since my poem was split into two. I really liked the idea of more explicitly splitting the poem, for although it is one poem, it was written about two very different moments. I think this idea is captured and more obviously showcased when the poem is numbered and split.

I made a Writing Center appointment and I received great feedback on ways to heighten the imagery of the piece. For instance, the line about “steel towers” was the suggestion of a peer tutor, which helped me in other areas of the poem to find exciting and creative ways to describe everyday objects.

Several writing tutors told me what they liked about the piece, including the physical movement of it, and the personification of Western. I used this feedback to lean into those elements and fully realize them as the core of the piece.

From both Writers Guild and my appointment with a peer tutor, I received overwhelmingly positive feedback on this piece, and it has remained relatively untouched from its first draft. Initially, I wrote this piece in the middle of one of my lectures and wanted to experiment with a total stream of consciousness style. Catching the spelling errors was the most helpful, as well as the general support and positive feedback for this piece.

There were several small spelling mistakes that had gone unnoticed to me, but they were very clear to another person. Coming back to it through another person’s eyes allowed me to revise and ensure that someone else would not misconstrue the poem due to small errors. I went back and made a few edits to ensure it came out in a more satisfying manner.

My feedback included a lot of great suggestions for line edits. While I’m used to receiving thematic feedback in this genre, sentence-level suggestions can really change the entire essence of a poem. The macro and the micro often become one in the same when it comes to poetry. As a poet, it’s really helpful when others give their insight on even the “smallest” of decisions—like verb tense, word choice, the decision to include or omit punctuation, etc.

I was given the advice to include more concrete imagery or metaphors early in my poem, so as to help ground it more. The ending is strong, but the beginning can seem abstract. One suggestion was to include a chant or slogan from the George Floyd protests, which is what inspired my poem. I decided to make one of the chants my title, which also serves as a sort of foreword too.

My main focus in the editing process was on the point of view. My piece plays with multiple perspectives: a personal perspective which focuses on my own experiences, as well as a “you” perspective that alternates between a “you” character as the narrator and a character in the story who is experiencing Chicago for the first time. The “you” perspective sounds confusing and convoluted even through a quick explanation, but the feedback I received helped me work through some of the clunkier perspective transitions.

I got some suggestions relating to word choice so that the syllables of my rhymes sounded better and more concise. I was informed that my poem does not tell a very complex story but it’s a complete one. I was suggested to introduce a conflict into the story to keep the reader’s attention and make the happy ending all that much more joyous, but I did not go that route. I wanted to keep it very simple.

Readers of the poem found the climax intriguing, but felt it lacked the right amount of imagery to convey the shock and intensity of the moment fully. Hence, I used visual notes and emotional traits to evoke more of an embodied experience. The distinction between lust and love was depicted as the contrast between the colors black and red. The protagonist starts to realize that they are clouded by the antagonist’s strong desires.

I received feedback about character introduction. The majority of my consultation was focused on pronoun choice and style of my writing. Reading the piece out loud was of much help when determining what words were better for reading aloud and reading in the mind. It was a positive challenge for me to do that!

Most of the feedback I received was aimed toward greater specificity, in wording and vocabulary. Lines like “we desire your love” turning instead into “we covet your conditional love”—covet having more biblical connotations, and the conditional aspect being important to the current situation of the narrator. Some of the feedback I received but did not agree with, was about the formatting and expanding the poem into more of a story. I thought separating the confessional text from the lines of the poem would create too much of a divide between the words I am trying to weave into conversation with each other. As for expanding the poem into more of a story, that felt too much like straying into prose.

This essay was still in the beginning phase when I submitted it for feedback. As the story deals with the recent death of my dog, I was consumed in finding a focus for the story. My tutor provided a few comments on syntax and structure, but her comment on a line she deemed “beautiful” stood out to me the most and became one of the few lines I kept from that first draft; the line was referencing the fear of the moment when I found the last stray dog hair.

Since this poem was my first attempt at an abecedarian, I asked my peers at Writers Guild for their assessment of image and cadence–did the content of the poem clash with its form? Since each line had to start with the subsequent letter of the alphabet, I was worried that certain word choices and line breaks, if read aloud, would sound unnatural. With Guild as a sounding board, however, each image flowed so well together that folks didn’t notice the form at all!

I think the feedback that was helpful to me was “this line feels a bit clunky!” or something similar to “maybe try moving this word here?” I really appreciate the line to line breakdown, as it felt more constructive and nudged me in a direction rather than simply commenting on the “feel” or emotion of the piece! I loved getting to play with syntax and word choices thanks to the feedback!