Hello, Queenbeme,
Welcome to Writing.com.
Here is a review for your "The Stone Confidants" .

Comments and Observations:

What a treat! A striking and elegant poem you have here. It made me think of Yeats and Hardy.

My first impression was a delightful surprise as if an architect were speaking in verse. By that I mean, you have carefully measured this poem's rhythm and rhyme. Then, the tone is eerie but reverent, also.

As to the concept that 'buildings "remember" the lives inside them' is handled beautifully and consistently. The “plaster breathes,” “walls as memory,” “silent archives,” and “ceiling beams hold echo of the lies” add to and extend your "building" metaphor successfully.

You have an exact, balanced, and mature way of talking about what you mean, especially between what's physical and what is abstract. Case in point, “A spine of stone, an innocent pretense // Of simple barrier, of painted wood,” suggests strength with sensitivity. And I loved your word choices, throughout:, as in "mortar’s dust, floorboards cease to creak, tapestry of sound..."

The poem, the way I see it, is smooth and in rhymed couplets of iambic pentameter. The rhyme isn't forced, and the enjambments help keep the poem from sounding mechanical.

Best yet, although its lines talk of objects, I could sense a guiet grief in the poem. Empathy beneath the architecture, any way one looks at it, I must say. It is almost telling me that memory is beautiful but heavy and burdensome.

Just a thought, here: Not that it's essential at all, but in that superb third stanza, each opening starts with "The". I wonder what would happen if you were to consider using variations such as, Each hasty oath… or Even cruel words… etc. Just something to experiment with; otherwise, third stanza is beautiful anyway I look at it.

In essence, you have a polished, hauntingly beautiful poem, here. I think this was because you gave architecture itself a history and a silent, moral presence.

Congrats for writing this gem of a poem!

Suggestions on the text as to grammar, usage, and punctuation

Everything is good and great in this area.

Best wishes with your work.





My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .