Leave This Song Behind | Review

Pages: 220

Genre: poetry

 

Synopsis

“Leave this song behind” features the best poetry from many teen writers that has contributed to Teen Ink. The topics and styles varies widely, and all the poems are divided into seven sections based on techniques and theme. In this collection is all from simple, thought-provoking poems to longer ones that paint vivid images with their carefully selected words.

My thoughts

Rating out of five:

I think there’s something a lot of “adult” poets can learn from these teenagers in that not every poem in a collection needs to be about the same thing described over and over. This collection had a lot of variation, surely because the poets behind it are so different personalities and it was nice to read through the different styles and themes. It also seemed to have made the collection especially difficult to fit together, as the subject of a poem can range from death and hospital visits to more light-hearted humor in a few pages.

It wasn’t always obvious that the writers were teenagers in the writing itself, most of them did a much better job than I could’ve and my (untrained) eyes see a lot of talent in here. But inexperience was more obvious in the subjects that were written about and, even though I’m sure I’m the same age as a lot of them, that decreased my interest some while reading.

There were some poems in here that almost made me tear up, or that communicated something to me, among a lot that didn’t. All in all, this seem like a fantastic project and I’m glad it exists to encourage young poets and creativity!

Here’s a couple example poems: