This is great. You're a really good writer.

This is beautiful and your writing style is so fantastic. The way you brought out the wife's emotions and thoughts perfectly is just, wow. I could literally feel the wife's emotions. I imagine this is exactly what a wife with her husband in the military would feel and write.. The imagery and metaphors are flawless. I enjoyed every word of it. (:

Breath-taking. The audience feels the wife dismay and her pain thanks to your powerful prose.

Wow, really lovely. Good work.

I really love this poem. It's deep and really helps others feel that woman's thoughts. Sunny

This is heart-breakingly perfect and it is well-imagined and beautifully written. You've captured all the feelings of a left-at-home wife of a soldier, all the hopes and dreams and desperation. I can taste her cold tea on my tongue and I can feel her tears brimming in my eyes.
Or maybe that's just my tears.
You are magnificent and I absolutely adore you.

Hey! I'm here to share some exciting news with you. This wonderful poem was added to the Miscellaneous section over at ADoR! :)

Here's the review:

"I'm going to be honest with you all, I hate poetry. I think we all do after years of high school where we have to analyse every word, punctuation and stanza break but this poem “Your Wife at Home” by Who is This Girl Anyway broke the mould for me.

Being part of a soldier family, the emotion hits me deep any way but I believe that any one who is aware of the hell that our troops face every day should be able to relate to the wife's emotions. This is thanks to the emotive and powerful language that Who is This Girl Anyway uses throughout the poem. Each word, line and stanza is filled with enough emotion to have a lump form in your throat, tears pooling in your eyes and goosebumps forming on your arms. Both through the writing and it being written in the wife's point of view, Who is This Girl anyway has created an image in the reader's head that allows for the reader to build a rapport with her; understanding her desperation to know that her husband is okay or for him to come home to her.

There's no need to over-analyse “Your Wife at Home” because it's all clearly there in a piece of flawless writing that is extremely current in this day and age. Slight word of warning, you'd best be sat near a box of tissues because by the end of it, you will be crying your hearts out."

Keep writing,

Helen

I’ll admit it – I’m not a big fan of poetry. But this poem is an exception; that’s for sure. It’s so beautiful and heart-wrenching. Yet you could see that the soldier’s wife really does love her husband.

I loved these lines: “I want you smiling in the starlight,
Grinning over poker with the lads,
Glancing at your cards and winking to your mate because you know you have the better hand.
Furrowing your brow and feigning a frown, then laughing as you flaunt a royal flush.
This is how I see you: shiny-eyed and happy.” It shows the want of a wife for her husband’s happiness, despite moments of great grief. I also liked the lines: “Did the angels want you, too?” and “Not old enough to lower to a dark, damp grave,
For me to plant poppies for.
And wish my love could save you.”

Yeah, okay, we get it. I liked everything.

Your writing style is also excellent and you put to good use poetic techniques.

I only thing I would comment on is “Before wedding or war,” with the comma doesn’t sound that good. Maybe a full stop would be better.

Also the last verse has many commas. Perhaps it would be better if you inserted a semi-colon in place of a few commas instead.

I think you've captured exactly what a soldier's wife would feel without her husband; the poem was quite sad. I loved your description of the soldier playing Poker, as well as from "It's dark outside, the stars are dim," to "Back when you were mine." I can picture it well, and it has a feeling of longing to it, like the narrator wishes those times could last forever. I also like the timelessness of your poem, it's quite nice. When reading it I thought it was someone from WW1, but it could be a soldier from any war. I love this line too: "Will he look like you when he bursts into life?"

Stylistically, it's great, but I do think there should be a period at the end of "Or might not be true,". Some other lines, too, I think would read better with a period, such as "Or maybe they won't send you home full,". I think it would sound better with a period.

But overall, it's excellent. :)

I like the depth you've put into this, and the imagery. Sorry I didn't review yesterday. It got too late. :) And since you're up next on the review forum as well, I might as well kill two birds with one stone.

Star motifs. Yay! *ignore me*

"Or might not be true," - I think a fullstop will be more suited than a comma there.

"Glancing at your cards and winking to your mate because you know you have the better hand.

Furrowing your brow and feigning a frown, then laughing as you flaunt a royal flush." - I think both of those lines are a little long. While the one in the first stanza works quite well, I think these two would do a little better split apart.

"This is how I see you: shiny-eyed and happy.

Like your letters promised you are:

"Be back by Christmas, back home soon,"

I hope that's true."

Maybe it's the way I'm reading it, but it reads a little funny. What I would do is, instead of a fullstop in that first line, have a comma or no punctuation at all so it flows into the second line, or else in the second line, instead of "are", have "be" since that relates it more to the first line. And the third I think a dash would be better for the dramatic pause - the comma dulls it somewhat.

"Before wedding or war," - this line dulls somewhat in comparison to the rest.

"buttercups" - another yay. I feel like a little kid all of a sudden.

"Maybe have a bairn or two to keep thing lively," - keep things lively?

"Misty-eyed as we lay close,

Numb to the cold, wrapped up in love,

Back when the world was sunshine,

Back when you were mine." - That's just like aww...

"Will you let you home to see our boy?" - will "they" let you home?

"Or maybe they won't send you home full,

Will you leave a limb on the front line? - I think a semicolon or a dash works better after full.

"And our jewelled dreams." - another flat line. I think that would work more passive, ie. our dreams made of jewels or something like that. This is just off the top of my head.

"Is there a bloody hole through the letter in your pocket, through the heart,

Your heart, my heart," - another one that reads a little oddly. Perhaps a colon after the first heart?

"Deserted in the mud: Is that all that's left of you?" - I don't think a colon is quite suited there. Semicolon perhaps, or dash or even ellipses. I can't see any of those, sadly.

"I wait, and wait, and wait." - Now there's an interesting ending. I'm still waiting. :) I gather that was intentional.

Most of this is stylistic, so feel free to ignore.

Good job.

I loved a lot of the beginning and the last stanza. I like the imagery of them playing cards and the narrators tone is so clear and well illustrated. My only issue was that somewhere in the middle, the consistent, slightly repetitive use of questions throughout the stanzas lost me a bit, but maybe I just have a short attention span. There's some very lovely imagery throughout and I think those are definitely the highlight of this poem. I like the allusions to PTSD and all the possibilities the MC runs through her head, it really drives some of these things home. Thanks for the read!

"Will you let you home to see our boy?" Do you mean "Will they..."?

"Why don't you write?

Is the fighting getting worse?

Is Hell seeping through your skull?

Has hope taken its leave?

Are you lonely? Are you frightened?

Have you forgotten me?

Have they hurt you?"

-The whole stanza of questions is really good, but the one that's dangling off of the next stanza is a little bit annoying. I would suggest one of two things: 1) push "Have they hurt you?" back up into the previous stanza, 2) (and I like this idea better, personally) give "Have they hurt you?" its own stanza; just one line, out there by itself, puts a lot of visual "weight" on the line.

"Or will you be a shell..." - FANTASTIC wordplay there. Adds a wonderful layer to this stanza. Great metaphor. This whole poem is full of those little layers, actually - I think the most impressive thing is that you managed to sneak all of those images and hints at multiple meanings in while keeping the voice of a soldier's wife both consistent and believable. The speaker isn't "dumb", but you can tell that she's not supposed to be Stephen Hawking. She's very simple, very honest, and sincere. It's often hard to write from a more plain voice, because it limits your diction and the level of complexity that you can acheive. However, you certainly overcame that here, and to great effect. There is complexity, but it doesn't come at the cost of the refreshingly simple voice of the speaker.

Stunning ending, too, especially with your use of rhyme. I like that you weren't afraid to rhyme (I know I am, because I'm often suspicious that it makes what I write sound childish), especially in places where you use it to create rhythmic effect. I think the end is by far the best example of it, though.

A great poem. Hope to see more like it in the future.

-twb

The woman who narrates this piece has a strong, distinct voice. I like the honesty and emotion she speaks with; it gives the poem a sort of intimate, conversational feel throughout.

I also liked the format of this poem. It's a bit strange, but I think it works. The infrequent rhymes and uneven stanzas help create a more personal style.

I'm going to keep mine short and simple comprared to everyone else: it's a well written poem. There, like I said, short and sweet :)

The style of this is very interesting. It's a very informal, conversational tone, yet at the same time works some very poetic devices in. At times I felt that the informality inhibited the potential of the imagery and emotions, but I did like the general effect of it. It made the narrator sound very young and vulnerable, which is true-young soldiers and their spouses are rarely ready to handle these emotions.

I like the wordplay you used here and there. Word couples like "wondering, wandering" and the rhyme at the end were little tricks that made the words interesting. Also, because this is a fairly long poem, it gave it some unity.

[Are they taking care of you?] I like this line. I'm not sure if naive is the right word, but it's such a natural thing to say that's so far outside the world of war.

[Did the angels want you, too?] This was also an interesting line. The image of Heaven drafting someone like the army is interesting, and kind of frightening when you think about how well it works.

I could probably pick apart individual lines for a while, but I'd rather appreciate the poem as a whole. It did get long after a while, and I'd consider running through this and seeing if everything is absolutely necessary to your message, but as a whole it was a great depiction of a very complex emotional experience.