[Certain]

symetrik: You were dealing in a strong case of ambiguity here, but you pulled it off because you moved the story well. I like that you took very little time describing characters provided images that gave us a sense of their identities. There were some flaws, even in the context of this piece's brevity and intentional vagueness. Some of the writing needed to be tightened. The third stanza felt particularly weak because "moldy clothes" really was the only fine detail and because what is she overdosing on? The ambiguity of her death was nice, though. On my first read, I wondered if she had died between the first and second stanzas, but that wouldn't make sense the way it was written. That would have been a sick twist, though. Anyway, the mechanics need to be cleaned up. Your rhyming was weak, even when you were hitting with a multiple-syllable rhyme. But I liked it, certainly more than I expected to upon looking at it. Welcome to the league. Don't be afraid to explore longer stories, either.

breathless: I thought you really had something in the beginning, for those first two stanzas. But I think you short-changed yourselfonce you started digging into the meat of the story because you wrote so little. There were huge gaps in this story, including pretty much all character development. Why would a husband and wife not know they were going to be in the same area at lunchtime? Why would she run to him like a long-lost friend? I wanted more answers than I got with your verse. The ending also was pretty lame. I'm holding this to a high standard because I think you're a really good writer who simply hasn't put himself fully into this league. This could have been a breakout verse from you had you continued with the pace and aggressive style of the first two stanzas, but it probably needed to be more like 24 lines instead of 16. I'd love to see what you could do if you really fleshed something out. But even though you wrote 41 more words than your opponent this week, I came away with more questions from your verse and a less settled resolution.

Vote: symetrik