9/11 Poem-Good or Bad?

Question

I made a poem once in fifth grade for a school project, and I thought it was pretty good, please tell me what you think of it.

On the night of September 11,
A plane crashed into the Twin Towers.
Where thousand of people worked,
We all feared the terrorists powers.
I wanted to cry when I thought about it,
As I sat in my house sad and scared.
While I watched it onfold on TV,
I felt something run down my face-a tear.
And though I knew no one there,
I felt a great loss.
When I thought about the families,
Their luck gone bad,
I could feel their longing,
for what they once had.

What's good, what's bad, what doesn't make sense? Give some CONSTRUCTIVE critisism please!

If you want to critique a line or two, just say the number of the line. I went ahead and numbered it for you, okay?

1-On the night of September 11,
2-A plane crashed into the Twin Towers.
3-Where thousand of people worked,
4-We all feared the terrorists powers.
5-I wanted to cry when I thought about it,
6-As I sat in my house sad and scared.
7-While I watched it onfold on TV,
8-I felt something run down my face-a tear.
9-And though I knew no one there,
10-I felt a great loss.
11-When I thought about the families,
12-Their luck gone bad,
13-I could feel their longing,
14-For what they once had.

Answer 1

The problem with poems about a particular event is that they either sound to speechy/preachy or the sound like a news reporter. You can't win when you take something like this on, because it's too big and it's too much in everyone's immediate memory.

Creatively, you should be able to pick apart images from the event and focus on a single image. That would allow you focus on one thing, really examine it in detail, forgetting all the politics and event-telling.

Answer 2

That is a very good poem for a fifth grader. I am wondering if you've ever played around with imagery and symbolism, two very powerful conventions of poetry, to get your expressions across in a more lyrical way. Instead of matter-of-factly stating what happened in lines 1-4, you could maybe make it seem more surreal with colorful words. You should check out an old song called "American Pie" for an idea of what I mean by that. It is about an actual event in history- three very famous rock stars died in a plane crash while they were on tour back in the 50's- but the writer of this song uses imagery, metaphor, and symbolism to convey the emotions of the event. For example, he sings, "Bye bye, Miss American Pie," which was the name of the plane, rather than just singing, "My three favorite rock stars crashed in their plane." See if this style works for you. This is a good poem, but I believe you can make it a GREAT poem.

Answer 3

1, It happened in the morning, not at night.
2. There were two planes, not one
3. Where thousands of people worked (Keep both parts plural)
4. Although the intention was to make us fearful, if anything it made us mad, not afraid.

Answer 4

Line 3 thousands not thousand
Line 7 unfold not onfold
line 9 and ten are good

Answer 5

i'm a poet myself and that i can truly say that your poem is fantastic. i'm not about to critique a poem it quite is about what you felt ... even with what the challenge is, consequently 9-11. do not ever enable all of us inform you that your poetry is undesirable or sucks, or purely would not make considering. you at the prompt are not writing a e book. you're writing about what you experience. I once had a school professor that taught me English and he did not something yet discover negativity in my stuff. I did what I had to do with my writing purely to bypass the category yet I hated him and went back to my tactics afterwards. save your thoughts on paper, it truly is continuously neat to bypass back and browse them years down the line.

Answer 6

Pretty good! Well done!! but change the number 1

1. On the day of Sept.11

Answer 7

I love your poem. It does great describing what happened on 9 - 11, and how you felt about it.

I would give you a ten out of ten.

Answer 8

That was awsome.No more than awsome so great I don't know what to say! It is alot better then mine in fourth grade! You're an awesome poetry writter. You should consider being a poet!!! Just plain out FANTASTIC AWSOME FABOULAS WOW!!!!

Answer 9

well in the beginning, in stead of thousand, put thousands, i like the words you used, but i didn't really like the word tv. try to use a more productive word instead of tv. and all this will sound great if you changed the words around and try to make it rhyme a little

Answer 10

1. it was not night, it was day.
3. should be thousands.
7. not onfold but, unfold.
i liked this piece of poetry very much. keep up the good work.