Solitude

I won't baby you. You have a lot to learn but I think you're a raw talent, your work has a distinct human touch and whilst this poem failed to shine in some places, I loved the tenacity in your words and the vunerability here. I'm usually a big cynic of poems like this, I used to write them; I still do, I feel this of a release, a personal piece -- I think you probably wrote this inspired by some deep feeling because I think it shows. Onto the actual poem.

'We dreamt in darkness,
a memory where there was no light'

One of these lines needs to be crossed out. May I suggest removing 'where there was no light', it's clumsy and following from 'we dreamt in darkness, a memory...' and continue there with the significance of the memory, not a reinstatement.

'Soothing shadows, umbral sighs
and barefooted walks from the doorway
(hush of the close)
to the bed.'

I feel your parenthesis worked better later on in the poem. Umbral is a pretty word but what give this piece a human touch was not the fancy words but the tone. You don't have to try and be clever to achieve this; it comes naturally.

' barefooted walks from the doorway'

holds a significance as a vivid memory. You need lines like this to increase the image.

I liked the second stanza:

'those caresses never reached
further than skin, never traveled
deeper than flesh.'

Seemed to reveal the lack of emotion since the 'touch' was only every physical? Or perhaps shows the fear and tentativeness of the persona. Thing is, the first line 'we feared taction' is too telling. I don't think you need it. Another example of a nice sound but...meaningless in context.

'Your hair spilled across my shoulders;
a velvet whisper over my nape,
and I hugged you closer, burying my tears
in your trembling arms. '

'Across' could be replaced, as 'spilled over' might be a better way of saying it. It doesn't quite sound right. 'Velvet' whisper. No, no. 'A whisper' is good enough for me. Sounds nice too. Singular, too. Quite ambigious.

How does one 'bury tears'. You could show the vunerability more here by having the persona not admit she was crying but through the image of 'burying her head' it shows her weakness, and her fear of showing it. Might be a nice touch.

'In the darkest of summer nights,
I was cold.'

See this could be improved a bit, too. To suggest it was a summer night and the persona was cold are two bits of contrasting information that could really work. Shows loneliness a lot more than forcefeeding 'darkness'. Especially since you repeat it in the transition to the next stanza.

'and imagined touches, perhaps,
(don't leave me)
that only caused me pain.'

I loved that. And the proceeding stanza and final couplet. It seems to tell a mini story. You need not be so forcing of unneccessary words, and forcing your emotions on the reader. Subtelty is your friend. Use it.

Keep it up.

I love it! I really do.
Closures of the poems matter to me so much, yours did it exactly like I wanted it to be..thank you :-)
I absolutely have no criticism. Great write
Congrats on the win, very well deserved!

Write on~

I agree with Ray. Fantastic wording. and a deserved win. Congrats.

I hate corniness it always sounds insincere yet I read this poem and I was so surprised the word beautiful was jumping in my mind and what I found fascinating was what I had just read was written by a poet who is a 16 year old young lady. Love its laid-backness and I know you are a good poet as I have read your winning entries in the competition suspect I have even voted for a few. I think this though is exceptional and I am going to put it forward for this weeks comp. id it has not already been entered and give it its excellence label of 5/5 truly I love good poetry and this is excellent 5/5 RayS

Oh my gosh, I'm in awe. This piece was wonderful.

"We dreamt in darkness,
a memory where there was no light."

^^ This was a wonderful opening. I immediately thought of something secret, or sacred. Was there possibly no light, because there was no truth to it? It was all some part of the imagination; a dream?

"Featherlight embrace; we both feared taction,
but those caresses never reached
further than skin, never traveled
deeper than flesh."

^^ This makes me think that whatever is going on here is somewhat limited, possibly due to fear. Though when I think about it, this brings us back to the fact that nobody is here with the persona; it is all a dream... this explains [to me, at least] why nothing went 'further than skin' or 'deeper than flesh'.

"I dreamt in darkness,
Remembrance, resemblance of blindsight.
Silent shadows, umbral nights
and imagined touches, perhaps,
(don't leave me)
that only caused me pain."

^^ This stanza is the one true part that gives off a strong hint of this other person not being there with the persona. "(don't leave me)" - the persona is scared of being alone, and was possibly just not wanting this dream to end; this "person" to leave them.

The ending was so simple yet powerful. A fantastic way to end this. I'm adding this poem to my favourite; I loved it. Well done.