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your syllable count is way off; what defines a sonnet is the consistent syllable count (or meter).

you need to fix your meter if you want it to be a sonnet. every line should have the same amount of syllables; instead, your poem goes as follows:



they all need to be the same number.

aside from that, this isn't a great poem by any means; you talk a lot about happiness in such an empty manner that it is devoid of happiness and it's rather lacking. to be blunt, you need to fix your abstract assumptions and give us some color and imagery to quench the thirst for happiness we should desire to feel when reading your poem. instead, we're left in a desert of emotionless sand, with a mirage of an oasis always on the horizon, never to be able to touch on that satisfying and evocative splash of water called emotion.

another thing, this poem could be misinterpreted to be an invitation to death but there's just not enough to hold it together (when you talk about chaotic societies, i don't find enough motive for suicide).

or maybe i got it backwards?

ok, i mean the number of syllables:

Stanza 1:
13
11
21
12

Stanza 2:
19
7
12
8

Stanza 3:
12
13
12
15

Stanza 4:
5
9

They need to be the same amount of syllables if you want it to be a sonnet.

As for my other image-laden criticism, I mean to say your poem doesn't have emotions with weight or color or size. You can't literally measure emotions but you can compare them to measurable things (there's more to say but I want to keep things simple). What happened in your poem is narrated through a sort of hybrid between monologue dialogue. I don't know much about point of view but seeing your point of view switch up so often is jarring.

Your poem lacks emotion due to the lack of expressions (figure of speech in metaphor, play on words, double meaning, enjambments, and etc.). Expressions are used to give effect to a statement. Imagine how bland a statement such as “he was sad” is, compared to a statement describing a “sea of grief.” The metaphor is sure to give the reader a better idea of the depths of grief in this situation. Your poem had, two blank characters, "chaotic societies," a field full of unspecified varieties of fluttering butterflies, one character telling the other character not to be alone, not to mope, not to be unhappy, to be happy, and to smile and fly near flowers, you mention the lack of "powers," a place where "everyone belongs," an unspecified amount of time which I will assume is eternity (forever and ever). I think that was it.

In all of that, what can we gather from it? The big hint that you makes me think of this poem as a suicide poem is "Forever and ever" which is where you mention "our happiness" to be strong and long. How many people live in happiness forever and ever? 1) nobody has lived forever and ever because 2) they died happy. If what you're saying about how happy you are at this moment, "Hush now" might be a hint of complaint or want to say something before dying happy; and "butterflies flutter" is an obvious thing but what else does this imply? I think, following the context of the poem asking a person to fly, maybe it's a butterfly that wants you to fly but if you do and you fly like they do, then you risk flying "unsteadily or hovering" and unsteadily is another hint at walking the thin line of life and death.

Also, the lack of comparison to anything concrete means I have to deduce what the tone is; how happy is the character? happy like a fat kid is happy to eat cake? no, just "happy" without explicit detail. Between the lines of abstract feelings (loneliness, unhappiness and happiness, and fear/doubt) there are mentions about being happy forever and ever, to ignore reasonable doubt, and to dare to step (unspecified where to) away from chaos, instability, to a place of fluttering butterflies (also unstable) so I'm guessing you're trying to convince someone to do something they would not otherwise want to do themselves.

This explanation is getting too big and I wanted to keep it simple. To be honest, I don't really think you intended to make your poem about a character trying to trick the other into suicide; I see a lack of poetic devices and lots of narrative. Instead, you mishandled the subject and didn't exercise all the necessary tools to convey a happy environment or atmosphere. More than that, you wanted your poem to mean something but in trying to write a sonnet your attempt was cluttered with the rhyme and lacked metaphor, imagery, and expression to really feel that "happiness" and instead wrote the opposite with a subtle conniving tone.

I hope this helped in understanding my critique better; if you have any more questions please feel free to ask.

okay, there are already commercials for this (How happy are our customers? Happy like a vampire at a blood drive.

You can tell that there's genuine excitement in a vampire in a blood drive, or a slinky going down an up escalator, or whatever. The point is that happiness doesn't come across without some sort of simile or metaphor. Without the simile or metaphor, or something that does give a character happiness or joy, the poem falls flat.

Happiness is an abstract idea; how do we know happiness is real? Because we can feel joy. Your job as the poet is to provide more depth and detail as to "how" and then let the reader decide whether they feel it or not.

You're the first poet to actually want to question my knowledge on poetry; I haven't raked my brain like this since '08 or '09. I'm glad someone is actually challenging the criticism, and not the critic.

Also: can you explain to me how you counted the syllables because it has been a long time since I had a literature class and when I counted the syllables, i tended to be a figure or two off yours?

Alright. I will do that. Thanks.