Hi- I’m new to the Urbis site and I am really diggin’ it so far. My only problem is I find myself a little out of my element when it comes to poetry. There seems to be a lot of poetry in my cue. I like reading it but criticizing it is tough when I don’t know the first thing about what is publishable. I want to be a help but I’m afraid I’ve annoyed many with crappy vague reviews. Short stories, novels and journalism, I can do- I’ve been doing for the last six years in school, but this poetry stuff is hard for me. Can anyone recommend some good guidelines for reviewing poets and/or good internet sources.
Thanks,
Charley

Heh, avoid reviewing them. They are enjoyable to read, but a lot of people have trouble reviewing poetry. And others can only give great reviews to poetry and lyrics. Stick with what you feel you can offer the most help with and skip the poems if you don’t feel you can be helpful.

I stay far, far away from them. I personally have a problem critiquing someone’s inner emotions made to rhyme. Not that there isn’t brilliant poetry to read, I simply don’t seem capable of being helpful on reviewing it.

You can go to the link for review requests in the box to the right of your queue (yeah, I just found this out myself) and you can pick and choose which specific genres you prefer to review from and only receive those in your queue from then on.

Hey, you can try http://www.everypoet.org/pffa/showthread.php?t=32934 – very nicely written.
And don’t listen to the forum metrophobes, poetry kix a$$ :P

I think that if you have an interest in learning more about poetry, then you should definitely pursue it. None of us would ever learn anything new if we didn’t explore unfamiliar territory. You could probably find a book or website on the subject of writing poetry that will teach you the intricacies of it. I don’t have any specific sites/books to recommend, but I am sure that you can find something fairly easily.
I have read some of your previous poetry reviews, and they seem pretty in-depth and well written to me. The type of reviews that I would be happy to receive, since they are at least intelligent.

Yes, try jebozid’s recommended site. It seems pretty straightforward and easy to understand.

Oh, I’m all for learning something new, and definitely encourage if it is what you would rather do. I would never intentionally try to hinder someone from trying to better themselves. I may have come across poorly last night and apologize for that – I was sleep deprived.

I understand poetry, and could probably offer decent reviews, but am most comfortabe in other aspects of reviewing. It’s just a personal issue for me, to criticize raw emotion that I may just be interpreting wrong. Boy, would Sheakespear be pissed had I reviewed any of his work. When I come across an incredible peice of poetry, I do risk a negative rating by offering my feelings on the peice, but I still try to be slightly helpful ;)

Yeah, Jebs right, a lot of us ‘forum users’ tend to be ‘metrophobes’...funny that. And I agree that poetry kicks a$$, but I am just offering my personal experience with it. Hell, I’ve written hundreds of oems; just can’t critique them.

Thanks all for the comments. I’ll check out that website because I want to be able to speak to poets with a little more confidence in technical aspects. That is my problem. I don’t want to waste someone’s credits with my personal preference, and when I get tired, my poetry review gets very odd- I look at them the next day and say “WTF!!!”. Awesome tip Karma about the preferences option. THANKS!!

If you seek the sources on poetic craft
Read all, it’s probably the best on the entire internet.

PS. Karma, review one of my poems, I promise not to refund it
::snickers::

Do it, Karma. I ventured a jebozid review. He didn’t refund me. ::snickers, too::

I don’t have a problem with poetry, but I care for my reviewer rating and so steer well clear of the genre that is filled with items written by people with thin skins and vile tempers. As soon as I stopped reviewing poetry my review quality rating average went from low 80s to high 90s.

Like Karma says, a lot of these poems seem to come from very personal places, and it seems that some find critiques on their words to be personal attacks on their emotions. Be careful, or just avoid.

Okay, Jeb, I’ll give it a go. Try to keep the whip put away until the next reviewer comes along. Not only do they hurt, that snapping sound makes me nervous…

Agreed Bravis- sometimes I’m just not in the mood to enter someone’s dark cavern of secrets. B.T.W., everyone can rip apart my poem “Shoulda had a Lizard Shake.” I have no emotional attachments to it whatsoever. :))