A question about poetic deletions?

Hi Ma. I am a 13 year old looking for opinions on my work, simply because lately I have been feeling quite lonely in the reality I live in. Basically, I hate the students who go to my school because I am preyed upon all because I enjoy school, and I look at things from a different point of view. As stated above, I am lonely, and just looking for some sort of place I can go where poetry is the best and most excepted thing that can be discussed.

And then I found this little section of Y!A, one that I had never seen before, and I loved it. After watching the activity for a while, I noticed certain people who wrote beautiful pieces, answered/ posted regularly, and were genuinely good folk. The feeling of acceptance I had been seeking out I found here, and it was so wonderful I couldn't control my addiction to this little slice of the web. Any time I can get to a computer, I check here to see what the regulars are doing. Even just having it pulled up on the screen is exciting for me. I post poems to hear what all of YOU have to say because I want to become as good as you all are. But...

Then there are the ones who come on here asking for us to write them things, do their homework. I can't stand it because, well, it reminds me of the people at school who put me through hell every day. They can't be here, not where I might belong, where I can try to fit in. No, they just can't do this to our work, to our poems. Our talent, what we have to show the world, they find a way to squash!

Yes, I love to read poems by those who really do post them to better their work or gain opinions, and I welcome them. But to those who think this is a joke, it's not. I just don't understand why we can't just be left alone.

The people, the poets, who have been using this section for so long, I salute you. You are all amazing poets, and your poems make me laugh, cry, smile, think. Do not be discouraged, you deserve so much better.

I too, was up late last night, looking for your pieces, and found none. I wrote one, posted it, and went to sleep discouraged. What has happened to this place? This is the question that has been racking my brain the last few nights. Now, I know the answer.

I am very new here, and hope that I will be looked upon with pleasure and you will all be excited to see my poems, not discouraged by their sight. I am not sure how this problem can be fixed, but a way must be found, before our little sanctuary is destroyed.

Edit- Is Buk Dave, or used to be? The one who had a question that was, "Will you tell me what it's like to kiss thunder and wither into the Earth?" It was deleated, wasn't it? I answered it and loved it! Ugg, I hate this!

And Blue Child, yes, I don't mind answering questions such as what is a metorphor or something along those lines. But, I refuse to write them a poem they have to for English class. They can do it themselfs, I am not helping those who hurt me. Many a time I have done such, many a time I have been used and taken advantage of. No more, there is only so much someone can take before...they.....break.....

The very reason I don't come here much these days. When I began almost two years ago, the poetry section was amazing. I remember how we encouraged one another, laughed, got upwards of 25 responses. So many of the truly gifted writers are now gone. I have no motivation or desire to write and post here. You can pretty much narrow the problem down to a few but no one seems to care enough to do something about it.

I agree about the homework and teens. The ones who post poems for the school work should be ashamed, IMHO. Who do they think they're helping? It's all about them, not the student they're harming.

What motivates someone to destroy beauty has always escaped me. Good on you for asking this, Ma.x.

Well I've just finished reading your question and all the answers. How humiliating for me! My poem I posted just before this question is still standing, with all but three noble replies! I just can't make the grade it seems!

When I look at the responses to a poem, if it has many TD's it is pretty much an indication of the poet's success.

It did occur to me once that the serious poets and readers here could select a Yahoo Q&A category which is obscure and rarely used. Via word of mouth we could all be alerted to this new sub region of poetry. Any ideas folks?

Good Morning everyone

The community is disfunctional, I do not want to name names, however I look for certain poets, one has responded that he deletes his own, a lot of us do this, however I took my medicine and learned that Yahoo answers is always going to be this way, it seemed like a wonderful place with wonderful people when I arrived unexpectedly, I have been shunned I have been embraced I have been kicked in the teeth, but what I ask is

what are we doing to reach out and bring in the others who want to be with us, Dave is not the only person targeted and we need to stop thinking of ourselves as the few elite, we are all people with feelings and every action is a reaction to something else

It sure would be nice to spin the wheel backwards and try again to build a sustainable group of poets that worked together for a common goal

we are all rather self serving and egotistical to a point, and the talent amassed in your answers alone is rarely found working well together.

I am doing my personal best to get along with and encourage those around me, however I am only human and I will slip many times before I get to the final goal

..

I think if all of us would post one good poem today it would be really nice but I expect some of us (me) might not be up to it.

For one, school is back in......and this IS a reference site of some sort, so of course yahoo isn't going to delete the kids questions who need help with their homework...ya know what I mean? They are going to delete the questions that are more so a Forum, as we make it, rather then the informational type. But we have some invisible trolls hiding under the bridge, and some of them are the yahoo staff themselves. The poetry badge is a weight, I have noticed, more report monkey's on your hands with it. I'm just glad I'm accepted here among the rest, because y'all bag on 13 year old's allot...how about I'm 31, psssstttt, almost 41.

I don't have much chance to be here since other things have become as important, but I miss the good, when I miss any, and This, as you say, 13 year old and homework answers seekers, ( Not to disregard the young, but) have seemingly taken over.

I can think of a dozen or more here who aren't in the top ten, yet are valid, serious poets. I won't call them by name, but even those attempting growth seem to push away from the composing table and move on to other things. Sad in my thinking.

Good question Ma.

The deletions are hardly poetic. As for why people are leaving, I believe it has more to do with personal affairs than these 'petty attacks'. Also, what is good poetry? I'm pretty sure I've found some in the strangest of places, and oddly enough, they weren't in a book or on a forum.

I agree. With the exceptions of advertisers, obscenity (there are children on here despite what Yahoo thinks) and severe personal attacks (on me, I am not here to defend others.) I don't violate anything for petty reasons.

But I get violated all the time. Some of my best pieces have been violated multiple times.

But if you gamble, you deal with the house rules. Yahoo has no interest in this place being functional.

What can be a plan of action? Move to another section? Is there a different site? I am up late at night and like Lizzy was looking for poems to read and there were none. For me, you all are my friends and I was a bit lonely - :( (sad face.)

No it isn't what we want Ma and I wish we could do something about it. Unfortunately I have come to learn that anyone who takes the opportunity of posting their poetry on here is subject to this pettiness, particularly if they are a good poet. I've come back after a 2 week break and posted a short tribute to Eileen Nearne - so far Grannjill and Yesu Benn have collected 13TD's between them because they responded to my work. It's the sort of pettiness I've come to expect from this site.