Ballerina

A Poem by Akcra

A daily Poem!

Ballerina

Little Ballerina dancing around

Dancing till she falls down

Pink silky shoe

She is secretly blue

Hides her emotion

Dancing with one swift motion

She'll dance till she dies

Through the air she flies

Twirling and turning

Inside she is burning

Round and round she goes

Sweet and gentle as a rose

She lets out a smile

And leaps for a mile

Inside she is crying

She'll never stop trying

The wood taps beneath her feet

She'll never retreat

Legs as long as the ocean

She hides her emotion

Little Ballerina dancing around

She'll never breakdown

© 2014 Akcra

Author's Note

I use to be a ballet dancer. But I stopped so this is devoited to my love of dancing

My Review

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Featured Review

This is a very cute poem. Being a dancer myself, there is so much truth and sweetness behind this. This is the type of poem that you should play with formatting. Some poems are best of simple, but the great thing about poetry is that it is free. You could make shapes and waves with your words. For example- when you say "Dancing till she falls down," you could literally have the words falling down in a little staircase. I don't know if it is possible on this website, but just a suggestion for your own personal enjoyment (and if you were ever to do something with this poem). You can ignore me, but if you wanted to add some more flair! :) Love!

Posted 9 Years Ago

1 of 1 people found this review constructive.

9 Years Ago

Thank you so much :)

Reviews

Emma Olsen

My best friend in high school was a dancer. I was always so jealous of how she could do the splits. lol But anyways, I do think you've chosen good, descriptive verbs and have some nice images going on. In the future, I'd encourage you to try to push both of these even more, but I think this is successful in that I can see this girl and how she moves. You might want to try experimenting so that you're not directly telling me her emotions, though. I'd rather see it in the way she moves, a little more subtly, and have some contrast in how she dances versus her inner world. Perhaps her dancing is beautiful, but her body is suffering? I know anorexia is a huge issue for ballet dancers, in particular, so perhaps that might be a way to allude to inner turmoil without directly telling me? Just giving you some ideas. You have some of this in the line 'dancing till she falls down' (should be 'til,' by the way. Till is a noun for a collection box or something.), but I think fleshing out some of this struggle more in metaphorical language might be beneficial in adding some depth and interpretation to your poem.

You might want to consider breaking this up into more stanzas, just as a suggestion. Longer lines could help flesh out a few of these images, too, to help make them fresher and more interesting. Sometimes you dip into cliche when you could be producing a stronger, more unique image. Try not to rely on general words for a concept to convey your meaning, as they often mean different things to different people. Adjectives are your friends. You generally do a good job, but I can see this being made into something more specific and personal. Someone below suggested playing with formatting, and that might be a good idea, too. I think the best thing you can do right now, in order to push yourself as a writer, is to experiment a LOT. Find out what works best for you and what doesn't.

In terms of the rhyme, I am generally not a fan of rhymes because too often they sound sing-songy and then work to destroy the tone and mood of the poem. Often writers will base their next line not of what sounds best, but what rhymes best. Keeping this in mind, some of your rhymes are working and some are seeming too 'easy' for me. For instance: "Pink silky shoe/She is secretly blue" I feel as if the 'she is secretly blue' line only exists as a descriptor because it rhymes with shoe. While I like the line 'pink silky shoe,' I think that perhaps some more consideration should go into the second line, at least into finding a way to craft it into something a tiny bit more original. Some other rhymes that I think you can push more: motion and emotion (too similar), smile and mile, crying and trying. Turning and burning maybe, also, but I liked the description of her as 'burning' and though you could maybe incorporate it elsewhere. Stuff to think about. I loved these rhymes because you managed to successfully pair similar sounds without it being entirely obvious: around and down, dies and flies (perhaps less so, but I think the images were strong here and the rhyme kept the mood and tone intact so it didn't bother me), goes and rose (loved this one), feet and retreat, ocean and emotion, around and breakdown.
Just make sure you're careful with rhymes. I generally avoid them unless to highlight a particular idea and line and use other poetic devices to shore up the poem. I know, when I was younger, I thought the point of poetry was to rhyme, but as I've grown older I've found a ton of great poems that are so much more effective because they ditched the rhyme. I think it mostly works here but needs a bit more attention and consideration on some of the lines.

"The wood taps beneath her feet" She is tapping the wood, it isn't tapping her. Just awkward phrasing.

Overall, I think this is good. Don't use that as an excuse to stop trying to get better, though. You definitely still have room for growth and to develop your voice more. While you still have time try to read and write as much poetry as you can. I know my junior and senior years of high school I basically didn't sleep (though some of that was also more because I was obsessed with art and wouldn't go to bed . . .), so capitalize on your time and get some exposure to as many different types of poems as possible. See what you can do. Look up poetic devices online and check out poetry.com or poemscom or poetryfundation.com for a sampling of what you can do. Most importantly, critique others work. If you become good at editing it'll be extremely helpful. Others will look at your work, but you'll rarely see them giving it the time and dedication that you will. Not only that, but when you critique others work, you often find yourself finding problems within their work that you hadn't realized you had in yours.
Good luck and keep writing!

Posted 9 Years Ago

You might want to consider breaking this up into more stanzas, just as a suggestion. Longer lines could help flesh out a few of these images, too, to help make them fresher and more interesting. Sometimes you dip into cliche when you could be producing a stronger, more unique image. Try not to rely on general words for a concept to convey your meaning, as they often mean different things to different people. Adjectives are your friends. You generally do a good job, but I can see this being made into something more specific and personal. Someone below suggested playing with formatting, and that might be a good idea, too. I think the best thing you can do right now, in order to push yourself as a writer, is to experiment a LOT. Find out what works best for you and what doesn't.

In terms of the rhyme, I am generally not a fan of rhymes because too often they sound sing-songy and then work to destroy the tone and mood of the poem. Often writers will base their next line not of what sounds best, but what rhymes best. Keeping this in mind, some of your rhymes are working and some are seeming too 'easy' for me. For instance: "Pink silky shoe/She is secretly blue" I feel as if the 'she is secretly blue' line only exists as a descriptor because it rhymes with shoe. While I like the line 'pink silky shoe,' I think that perhaps some more consideration should go into the second line, at least into finding a way to craft it into something a tiny bit more original. Some other rhymes that I think you can push more: motion and emotion (too similar), smile and mile, crying and trying. Turning and burning maybe, also, but I liked the description of her as 'burning' and though you could maybe incorporate it elsewhere. Stuff to think about. I loved these rhymes because you managed to successfully pair similar sounds without it being entirely obvious: around and down, dies and flies (perhaps less so, but I think the images were strong here and the rhyme kept the mood and tone intact so it didn't bother me), goes and rose (loved this one), feet and retreat, ocean and emotion, around and breakdown.
Just make sure you're careful with rhymes. I generally avoid them unless to highlight a particular idea and line and use other poetic devices to shore up the poem. I know, when I was younger, I thought the point of poetry was to rhyme, but as I've grown older I've found a ton of great poems that are so much more effective because they ditched the rhyme. I think it mostly works here but needs a bit more attention and consideration on some of the lines.

"The wood taps beneath her feet" She is tapping the wood, it isn't tapping her. Just awkward phrasing.

Overall, I think this is good. Don't use that as an excuse to stop trying to get better, though. You definitely still have room for growth and to develop your voice more. While you still have time try to read and write as much poetry as you can. I know my junior and senior years of high school I basically didn't sleep (though some of that was also more because I was obsessed with art and wouldn't go to bed . . .), so capitalize on your time and get some exposure to as many different types of poems as possible. See what you can do. Look up poetic devices online and check out poetry.com or poemscom or poetryfundation.com for a sampling of what you can do. Most importantly, critique others work. If you become good at editing it'll be extremely helpful. Others will look at your work, but you'll rarely see them giving it the time and dedication that you will. Not only that, but when you critique others work, you often find yourself finding problems within their work that you hadn't realized you had in yours.
Good luck and keep writing!

Rating /100

9 Years Ago

Thank you, I'll definitely take your advice.

Benita-Staebell M - Kin..

My Great Grandmother was a Ballerina Dancer very, very Tall beautiful Irish woman
I look just like her and I love Ballet and the music I love dancing also.

A very lovely piece thank you for sharing.

Blessings. Kindred poet