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Advice for the Question: "Is this worth leaving?"
My favourite tip is:
Cut down the poem or piece of prose to its barest bones: everything except for the nouns, verbs, and articles goes. Read it and answer these questions:
1) Is there a clear message left?
2) Is the message interesting, real, unexpected, touching, energetic, humorous, important, original, and/or honest to your perspective on the subject (in other words: Are you being a hypocrite?)?
3) Is this message what you want it to be?
If the answer to the three above is yes, move onto the next step: adding to your message if necessary. Reword it, make it clearer, make it sound like you want it to get across to your readers. After that, reread your poem, and one by one, restore the adjectives and adverbs, and "smart phrases," where needed. Use them only to empower and enhance your piece of writing, and leave them out when you can do without. This will create a stronger message which has been previously camouflaged in all your "make up." Oh, and if the answer to those 3 questions was no, the answer is usually "recycle," because a poem based entirely on descriptions and smart-aleck phrases has no backbone, and is consequently weak.
Any more possible suggestions for the famous question—to get rid of or to keep?
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The woods are lovely, dark and deep....but I have promises to keep...and miles to go before I sleep...and miles to go before I sleep.
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