I Would Leave Me If I Could

I'll be honest: I don't like Halsey as a person (or, well, I don't like the Halsey I perceive as a public figure, more accurately, since I don't know what she's like as a person, not really). I like the majority of her music, though. I put off reading this for quite a while because I didn't really want to read another half-assed book of Instapoetry by a famous person.

In retrospect, I should have remembered that Halsey is an excellent songwriter, and not worried so much. This collection is pretty damn good! And pointedly not Instapoetry -- Halsey displays both effort and care in her poems, which...I just...why are we living in a world where that's a rare thing?!

So. I might have a secret soft spot for her, now. Damn it, good poets are my one weakness. :P

The good: Halsey's writing strength is definitely in her imagery. She doesn't apply it as often as I think she could, but when she does, it's brutally satisfying. She takes what is rough and simple and makes it very engaging, creating a definite picture in your mind -- it honestly put me in the mind of bright, sharp-edged street art. Her rhythm is also quite good, if a little irregular (there are some weird line break positions in a few of these which interrupt the flow of the reader), and a lot of these poems, I suspect, may have been song possibilities at some point.

The bad: Some of the rhyme structures in a few of these don't quite fit the themes she's writing about. In my opinion, a very tough-to-chew piece like "A Story Like Mine" needs a little more gravity, and the quick half-rhymes of some lines just feel...off? A little distracting?

But overall? This is some good stuff. Really good stuff, in fact. I'd love to read further poetry from Halsey, and am really looking forward to how she grows poetically.