Wings of Glass

Per your request for critique, here are my thoughts on your poem:

After reading the poem, my first thought is that you have the requisite emotional conviction to make this a viable poem, but there are several areas for improvement related to form, diction, imagery, punctuation and most importantly intent.  There are also a few mistakes in regards to sound and flow, but for the most part, that was not an issue.  I will start with poetic intent, because all the rest of it doesn't really matter as much (to me).  Once you know, without a doubt, what you want to say, then all the rest are just some rules to be aware of, some tricks to make your vision presentable.  

About intention, the question is simple:  what is this poem about?  Often, in a poem, there is at least one crystallizing line that brings the intention of the poem to the forefront. As I look through this poem, I'm trying to find that one line that gives me the basis, the summary, the crux, or even the hope of this poem.  In my experience, it's only after one encounters this line in a poem that you can begin the process of  really assimilating the poet's vision into your own mind, i.e. the poem doesn't really start in earnest until then, even if the line is not at the beginning of the poem.  For me, this poem does not really begin until I read this line:  "Why does the constant throbbing remind me so/Of the worthlessness of my self?"  This is where you really tell the reader what the issue is, what the critical information is that you felt important enough to impart to the universe.  Your heart, even as it throbs, even because it throbs, it reminds you of your "worthlessness".  This is the one idea that I would start with, and around which that I would build the whole poem.  The rest can be supporting evidence, context, metaphorical extensions, or conclusions of this.  Perhaps you intended the analogy of the heart to glass to be this crystallizing line/idea.  If so, then I would caution you that, as a metaphor, it is overly cliché (something which you, yourself, point out in the poem!)  Because it is cliché, and (more importantly), because its relevance to your intent is not apparent without the well worn relationship between the qualities of glass and the idea of the heart breaking, it should either be avoided, or it should be approached with a fresh idea, perspective, wording.  It’s up to you, but I feel like it trivializes the feeling you may have wanted to convey. 

     The door slams with a resounding thud

     The air is empty with silence

     Void of sound

     It's deafening

This disembodied narrative seems a bit empty in terms of purpose and feeling.  I could see this as the beginning of a story, and it conjures up the image of someone leaving your space, the room you’re in.  To start the poem off this way, the reader will want some relevant follow through concerning the importance of this event.  

Also, the idea of silence being deafening is an oft used oxymoronic literary device that, while it has a distinct honesty to it, seems bland and uninspired here.  You simply state it, without any poetic abstraction.  Again, it might be perceived by some readers as indicative of a lack of imagination or effort to put your unique stamp on this feeling. 

     My hands are trembling weakly

     I can feel the lava coursing through my veins

     And it cools and turns to frost

     I am alone

     Forever.

     Forever and a day

     But it won't last

     I know

You continue with narration, still without context.  The lava metaphor is somewhat effective as mood descriptor, but then the sudden change to frost seems to be without explanation.  I assume you mean for the reader to infer that your emotion has changed, and that the isolated lines “I am alone/Forever” is meant to portray a new observation - new feeling.  But the whole thing still feels like there’s no context, no relevance to the reader.  With prose, you can, at times, build up a scene with mysterious actions and characterize mysterious feelings for pages without offering much in the way of cohesive context.  That is assuming you can connect it to something relevant later in the story.  With poetry, it’s important to pull the reader into some sort of understanding with your intent right away - with the first couple of lines, if possible. 

I have written poems (which I felt were successful) where I didn't ever let the reader in on the secret intent.  I think you can write that kind of poem if you make it interesting, if the mystery is attractive, if you offer the reader something transcendent or forbidden or revealing to grab a hold of. Because your poem is somewhat straightforward in its wording and delivery, it’s more important to reveal the purpose early on.   It’s still not too late, at this point in your poem, to let the reader in on the secret as to why these things are happening.

     This constant chill, this constant burn

     The fluctuations drag my mind all over the place

     Music plays and fills my head

     There's a disquieting absence of rational thought

More disembodied, disconnected narrative fractions.  I've made this same kind of error before, and I've seen it happen in a multitude of poems on dA.  You have basically strung together a series of observations.  Each one of them, by themselves, may serve as a good starting point for a poem.  But these are thrown together without context, without regard to how they flow or fit with each other, and they seem to be tangents to a central idea that, as of yet, you still haven’t really revealed to the reader.  

There’s an idea in free verse poems that you can leave space in between lines.  This is not a physical, typographical space.  It’s a space in meaning, in imagery, in energy.  Imagine each line in your poem as a stepping stone high in the air.  Your job as the poet is to align these stones in such a way so that the reader than traverse them, one after the other.  

There is a special relationship between adjacent lines in a poem.  They must feed off of each other, one leading into the other.  However, if you put them too close together, the poem will read like a nursery rhyme.  If you put them too far apart, the reader falls through the gap in between, with no way to continue their journey without a disconcerting interruption in the “flow”.  The trick of a good free verse poem (and probably, any kind of poem) is to put just the right amount of space between the lines, such that it takes a sizable leap from one idea or image to the next.  

Now, if you pace the reader, if you prepare them, there are times when you can teach them to fly, so that they can marry even the most disparate ideas together in a poem.  This type of skill is both in the poet and in the reader.  It’s possible that you are simply asking too much to go from “this constant burn” to “fluctuations drag[ing] my mind” to “disquieting absence”.  The distance between these thoughts is immense.  And, again, you have provided no legend from which to interpret these symbols.  

     If hearts were made out of glass

     Cliche as the thought might be

     I curl into a ball and wonder

     Would mine still be considered a 'heart'?

This strophe is, at once, both critical and detracting.  It is a very important strophe that I think you recognize is the crux of the poem, the turning point, the words that will give the reader what they've been missing - the key to understanding your intent.  Because you've chosen this point to reveal this glass heart metaphor, the reader naturally will give these lines the most awareness, especially considering how starved they've been for a purpose to this point.  But, what is the point?  First off, the question you pose in the strophe comes off as rhetorical: “If hearts were made out of glass/Would mine still be considered a “heart”?”  So, are you questioning whether hearts are mislabeled? Certainly, if all hearts were made of glass, and that was part of what made a heart a heart, then the answer to the question of whether yours would still be considered a heart is an obvious “yes”!  I think what you really meant to ask here is:  if your heart was made of glass, is it really a heart?.  Or, perhaps you meant to ask: if all hearts are made of glass, is there really such a thing as a heart, at all? 

 

As unintuitive as it may seem, it is important to apply logic to a poem.  Even if you are making up all the rules, you still have to follow them.  Ultimately, though, it’s not the faulty, rhetorical question that ruins this strophe and (for me) poisons the poem, it’s the whole glass heart analogy.

     I can feel them as shards of broken glass

     I can see them piercing my soul

     With weapons and fragments of feelings

     With daggers and poison of jealousy and guilt

     With hammers and spears of hatred and sorrow

As I pointed out previously that the glass heart is not effective here, building upon it does not save the poem for me.  Also, the way in which you play on the metaphor with “shards”, “weapons/fragments”, “daggers”, “hammers/spears” are very predictable and impersonal.  There is nothing that ties the materialization of these metaphorical glass heart fragments to what is really going on.  You have continued to abstract your feelings with isolated descriptors and metaphors, and have not offered any objective evidence with which to relate the images to what’s really happening, nor have you made these images appear unique, or expressed them in an unusual or interesting way.  Without accomplishing at least one of these things, the glass heart analogy does not increase the reader’s interest in or understanding of your intent.

     If hearts were made of glass

     Why do I feel mine beating so weakly?

     Why does the constant throbbing remind me so

     Of the worthlessness of my self?

Finally! This is something I can sink my teeth into.  Here is the salvation of your poem, in my opinion.  Ignoring the first line in the strophe, we’re left with “Why do I feel [my heart] beating so weakly?/Why does the constant throbbing remind me so/Of the worthlessness of my self?”  This is the only part of this poem that holds both the sense of poetic honesty as well as the key to your actual poetic intent.  Yes, why does it beat weakly?  Why does its throbbing remind you of your worthlessness?????  This is the question!!!  It’s so simple, but its simplicity does not make it ordinary.  It sings to me, the reader, because it reveals something beyond itself.  It has meaning swirling around it, and that meaning enhances it.  The space between the lines is perfect.  We go from “beating weakly” to “[its] constant throbbing remind[ing] [you] “Of the worthlessness of [you]”.  There is much space between these lines, much distance to traverse, but there’s just enough relevance between them, enough truth, to fly over the gulf.  If it was my poem, and I wanted to re-write it, I would throw out everything except what you have right here and start with this.

     It's disgusting. It's pitiful.

     The tears spill silently, as I muffle my screams into a pillow

     I lie restless, breaths strained and painful

     I hate this.

This strophe is literally lines of prose that have very little poetic or aesthetic value to me.  They are narrative elements that don’t connect with the previous, wonderfully introspective and philosophical lines, and they still don’t answer the question of what you’re really talking about.  The line “I hate this” is probably the most superfluous line in the whole poem. I think you’ve made it quite clear already you hate whatever is happening.  

     If hearts were made of glass.. Mine would be a heap of tainted pieces.

     I wonder, can I form these broken shards into wings?

     Transceding wings, that disappear in the light

     I wonder, if I gather enough pieces of glass

     If I spill enough of life-giving blood on these, that were thrown away like me

     Can I fly away?

At least here, you've attempted a new direction with the broken glass heart analogy: “Transcending wings” has some intrigue, I suppose.  The idea that spilling “life-giving blood” on the broken glass would form wings is a little bizarre, but I actually like the imagination.  You are creating an image that hasn't been regurgitated a million times.  Again, I don’t like the broken glass heart, and I don’t much like plainly throwing “wings” into the poem.  But I do like keeping the theme of transcendence, and the question of transforming your suffering into something that gives you freedom from it.  

     Leaving everything behind, leaving everyone behind

     Leaving even my very self behind

     I'll unwillingly collect the glass, the broken, tainted fragments and shards of my not nonexistant heart

     And I'll fly away one day

     I'll give up on everything, and fly away;

     On transparent wings of glass

"nonexistent"

“Leaving [your] very self behind” is a good concept to incorporate, but it needs some more poetry to it.  Your poem has some very basic lines, basic ideas.  Sometimes, it’s good to just contemplate an idea and see if there is a more interesting way to say it, or give it even more value by surrounding it with context. What are you leaving?  The thing which has broken your glass heart?  What is it?  You've never said. You have somewhat successfully connected the  transformation you mention in the previous strophe to the reason for it: flying “away one day”, giving “up on everything.”  And the last line, while somewhat cliché, at least has some aesthetic value to it.   

If you feel like the glass heart is what you really want the poem to be about, then I would work on how to really tie this analogy together with some actual event, or some aspect of yourself with which the reader can identify.  Decide what the poem is really about, and why you want to write it, how you want to write it.  Be consistent, or be purposely inconsistent.  There can be no throw away lines in a poem.  And just because you feel like a metaphor fits with your intent, that doesn’t mean that you should just stick it in there and hope for the best.  You need to carefully mix it into the fabric of a poem.  Or else, if you mean to shock or surprise the reader, then make it shocking or surprising. Don’t rely on the presumed context of a metaphor to do the work you are unwilling to do, such as explaining how a heart can actually be glass and break, and how that is to be interpreted into an actual feeling, and what could have happened to cause this. 

Once you decide on what your poem is really about and how you’re going to write it and what metaphor or metaphors you will be extending into the poem, be cognizant of the space between the lines, whether or not they follow the rules you’ve established, and what experience you’re providing the reader with. Reread the poem and determine for yourself which lines truly resonate with you, which really came from inside of you, rather than outside.  I contend that it is the strophe of the weakly beating heart and its relationship to worthlessness.  Maybe I’m wrong, but that’s my opinion.

I hope some of this helps.