Christi Wood

              Awaiting the Stranger

Standing in the pale moonlight,

the sideways glance of passersby

reminded the lonely lover in black

of what she awaited.

The silent stillness of the night

enveloped her dark frigid figure

as fear took over

and her blood ran cold.

Her pulse slowed as her

heart beat quickened

and her blue eyes turned to steel

as the moment awaited grew closer.

Thoughts of unknown abandonment

entered the timid thoughts,

quickly shoved away

with the knowledge of their ways.

The slow tick of her watch illuminated the silence

as the transparent stranger approached.

Seconds to go, she braced for the exchange

and accepted fate as he walked right through her.

Waiting (Original Poem without revisions)

I waited but he never came.                              1

Drip, drop, drip drop.                                       2

The sound echoed,                                           3         

loneliness enveloped and fear took over.           4         

The feeling so long awaited,                              5

seemed so far away.                                         6

The time hoped for could be lost                       7

with more waiting and uncertainty.                     8

Looking into the unending openness                  9

I wondered if the time would come,                   10                   

or had my chance been lost forever.                  11       

Standing there I sensed the presence.                12

The peace and joy had finally come.                  13

Awaiting the Stranger (1^st Revision)

Standing in the pale moonlight                           1

The sideways glace of passersby                                   2

Reminded the lonely lover of                                         3

of what she awaited.                                                     4

The silent stillness of the night                            5

enveloped her frigid figure                                             6

as fear took over                                                          7

and her blood ran cold.                                     8

Her pulse slowed as her                                                9

heart beat quickened                                                     10

and her blue eyes turned to steel                                    11

as the moment awaited grew closer.                              12

Thoughts of abandonment                                             13

entered the thoughts,                                                     14

quickly shoved away                                                     15

with the knowledge of their ways.                                  16

The tick of her watch illuminated the silence                   17

as the dark stranger approached.                                  18

Seconds to go, she braced for the exchange                  19

and accepted fate as it walked right through her.            20

Awaiting the Stranger (2^nd Revision)

Standing in the pale moonlight,

the sideways glance of passersby

reminded the lonely lover in black

of what she awaited.

The silent stillness of the night

enveloped her dark frigid figure

as fear took over

and her blood ran cold.

Her pulse slowed as her

heart beat quickened

and her blue eyes turned to steel

as the moment awaited grew closer.

Thoughts of unknown abandonment

entered the timid thoughts,

quickly shoved away

with the knowledge of their ways.

The slow tick of her watch illuminated the silence

as the transparent stranger approached.

Seconds to go, she braced for the exchange

and accepted fate as he walked right through her.

Revision Account

This is the first time that I have been encountered with poetry reading and writing, so I had no idea what I was going to write about. My first thought was to write a basic poem that rhymed, which I did, and then I read the first reading and saw that it was not good to do that, so I started something new. I wanted to do something fun with structure, but I did not know where to start. I also wanted to do something different. I decided that I would write a poem that could have multiple meanings. I wanted a broad subject that people could read and comment on in different ways for what the poem is about. I began writing “Waiting” because I figured the person in the poem could be seen as waiting for different things. After getting feedback from others, I saw that my approach worked because I had different reactions.

            In the beginning, I was only writing the poem because I had to for this assignment, but after getting some feedback and reading our assignments,  I began to get into the writing and started enjoying what I was doing. I actually wanted to write something that is somewhat good for an amateur poetry writer. I received some very good feedback about my poem which helped me to revise it. I was lucky to have been paired with someone who is very knowledgeable about poetry, so he was a lot of help in giving me ideas on how to revise. I learned that it is very important to get other advise and opinions, because my poem was very plain and not to standards in my first writing. Without the constructive criticism I would not have had the drive to revise and continue revising.

            When I first wrote my poem, I did not give it very much thought because I wanted to get something on paper. I sent it to J.J. Torres and he sent me back some wonderful feedback. He told me that I needed to add more imagery to the poem and he was right. When I read through it I realized that I had put no imagery at all so I began revising. The poem ended up taking a whole new form. I left the same idea, but I moved the lines around to fit together better and make room for imagery. The first revision after feedback from J.J. is as follows:

1^st Revision:

1 “Pale moonlight” imagery

2 mood of possible nervousness

3 loneliness from L4 of original

4 waited from L1 of original

5 imagery changed from “feeling” to “silent stillness”

6 “enveloped” from L4 original

7 “fear” from L4 original

8 added for feeling

12 “awaited” from L5 original

I still felt that this draft could be better so I reread and revised again.

2^nd revision:

3 added “in black”

6 added “dark”

13 added “unknown”

14 added “timid”

17 added “slow”

18 added “transparent”

20 changed “it” to “he”

            This is the third revision after Jackie Baker sent me some analysis. I ended up changing a lot of the poem, so I could not use much of her advice, but she did give me some great feedback if I chose to stick with the original poem.

3^rd revision:

1 comma after moonlight

2 lowercase the

3 lowercase reminded

            I had a hard time giving my character a name or persona which is something that J.J. suggested. This poem is still a work in progress and I would like to continue tweaking it and adding on and work toward finding a person to put into it. I feel that it does leave you hanging at the end, but I did this so that I could continue with it. I plan to try to get a better understanding of poetry by reading more and studying it more and then try to put what I learn into revising and reworking this poem.