Original:  

if you lost me

yes you lost someone who is highly flawed

you lost someone who is still learning to love

you lost someone who is still learning to BE loved

but you lost someone who is TRYING

you lost someone who will love you 

with their whole heart

you lost someone who loves to smile

and loves to make others smile

you lost someone who would buy you gifts

someone who would never forget you

you lost someone who will fight for what they believe in

someone who will fight for you.

someone who will never give up

someone who will fight for you

someone who will talk to you for hours if you wanted them to

you lost someone who would tell you everything about their day

and all the things that make them excited 

And listen to you in the same regard

i am NOT perfect

i’m so far from the greatest friend

but i am enough

i am enough for people to love me

just ask the people who do

if you lost me

it’s your loss

not mine

i hope you never forget that

EDITED: 

if you lost me

yes you lost someone who is highly flawed

you lost someone who is still learning to love

you lost someone who is still learning to BE loved

but you lost someone who wants to love you

you lost someone who loves to smile

but loves to make others smile

you lost someone who will remember you

you lost someone who will fight for what they believe in

someone who will fight for you.

someone who will never give up on you

someone who loves to talk to you

someone who loves to listen to you talk 

Someone who would listen to you forever

though i am NOT perfect

though i am not the greatest friend

i am enough for people who love me 

Editing process: 

As I said in my previous poetry analysis, I like to start my editing process by thinking about two main things to fix, one general structure/subject aspect and one specific literary device. If it still doesn’t sound good, then I will go further. Also, sometimes there is only one of these two categories which need work. In that case, I will start with that one thing. This helps me to prioritize my ideas and prevent myself from getting lost. 

In this poem, I didn’t like how the poem was turning out when I added more literary devices. So I just decided to fix one structural aspect. I noticed that parts of the poem are very clunky. There are many long sentences and I thought it would make sense to condense some of the verses. I tend to write more than necessary sometimes when writing because I dump all my emotions out the first time I write about something. For this poem especially, I didn’t really like how it was sounding. 

I decided to find ways to shorten the verses in a way that would allow me to keep the same message. For example, the 4th verse seemed to have very redundant bits to it. I was going for ‘someone who would listen to you and someone who would talk back’ but I said it in so many words which didn’t even string together all that nicely. Instead, I replaced it with “Someone who loves to listen to you talk.” I think doing this allows the poem to flow much better than when there was more. 

One piece of advice that I have when it comes to writing poetry is that ‘more is not always better.’ Sometimes, having more words in certain lines or stanzas can actually make the poem seem more disjointed. Additionally, sometimes really long poems can become quite redundant if not written well. A lot of really powerful poems are just a couple lines long. Just something to think about!