The line "What a ruse" has captivated me beyond all else. I'm sitting here in awe, basking in your ability to connect so well to the reader. You took a difficult subject to talk about, and expressed words of truth and pain. Great work! :D

amazing. painful. beautiful beyond comparison.

xoxocasey

OO chilling. It was really creepy. See I guess someone else's name is Naomi who was your beta reader only Naomi is my name so I read that and I'm like WOAH. Haha. Anyway, I love the title. And just everything. My favorite lines are "the love in your gaze/(what a ruse)" I love the idea of that one, heart stopping gaze. I can see big, love filled brown eyes that, instead of making you feel wanted, make you feel empty and hollow and a little bit used. Wow. Very inspiring. I love it.

you did a good job with explaining but not putting too much out... good job kario

That was . . . how I felt. congratulations on capturing it.

Oh... wow... that was beautiful! In so few words. That's sometimes very hard to do... but you pulled it off very nicely. Nice, wonderful work... I love it. Keep it up! :)Tasha

ow, short, painful, and just sugarloads of fun for a hyperactive beaver on crack, a muchly excellent poem

So much revealed in so few words.

Excellent poem.

Take care, D.

beautiful (:

I wasn't expecting that. blinks It's interesting watching the atmosphere change so dramatically in between each line- and that's the beauty of short poems. You packed a lot of emotion and depth into these three lines and made effective use of the layout. Me likie.

I've been thru ths (let's get that out of the way quickly) and I have to say I admire this. Concise, saddended, and of course intense- it's perfect.

-jess

Oh, wow! This is just so powerful. It's simple but the words you chose give it such an impact. "(what a ruse)", the sarcasm in that is spectacular, after following the first line... And "the smell of / you upon me /can't wash it away/." Just so great! It gives me the chills... It's so simple and short but just BAM! Hehe, I'm ranting. Anyway, magnificent job.

-marie

Intense and true.

I must ask on what inspired you to write this.

MuCh LoVe,*Senshi's Tenshi*

Oh...sadly, I know what this is like, but I think you did a great job of portraying the emotion in just a few lines. :)Luv,Allie and/or Cut

i've been having an odd feeling that i've been stalked during vacation, and i come back and read this poem. dun dun dunn. heh, rape is...painful to say the least. i've been reading a lot of angst books lately (want to improve my writing style), and sometimes it really surprises me how life can be so...topsy-turvy. i've always been a fighter, so i've always wondered, what if this happened to me? heh, sorry, just my wandering thoughts. as always, your poem inspired, and that's the best compliment a poet can get.

sumi-chan; what you call love, i call pain.