Ill always crave the warmth of your embrace
and looks of your bewitching eyes, but then
as time goes by, I hate to see your face
and long to be myself and free, again.
The damage love can do should scare us all
but still we crave such love. It leaves us sick.
Although no cure for love is taught at school
we learn to heal its cuts and scars so quick.
My lust for you it seems I can’t destroy
because when we were bound i felt alive.
but lust is hate when it's deprived of joy
and joy is what we need: need to survive
If life is love then death is hate, I live
to use my love. is all that i can give
Hi Sparky,
ReplyDeleteI'm really pleased with how your sonnet turned out, you've got the rhyme scheme and iambic pentametre down almost perfectly. The one rhyme that doesn't quite fit is 'all' and 'school', it half does but not quite. But apart from that, great!
You've remembered to use enjambement and caesura, good job, but I think there are a few places where you could tighten it up a bit, for example the second survive on line 12 I'd put a full stop as it doesn't really flow as a continuous sentence (right word?).
And some literary pedantry; start all lines with a capital letter whether they're end-stopped or enjambementated and I is always capitalised etc etc. And always double check your work before posting, as on line 14 I'm pretty sure that the 'is' (which should be capitalised after the full stop) should be 'It's' which would make more sense.
But otherwise, good job! Keep up the hard work :o)
Hey,
ReplyDeleteThe metre and rhyme in this are flawless - very impressive indeed! My only quibbles are with your punctuation at the end of the poem: full stop at the end of line 12. Comma after "love" and semi-colon after "hate" in line 13, and as Frances says, I'm sure you meant "It's" rather than "is" in the last line.
That I can only pick out these tiny things shows how well you've done with the tricky sonnet - very well done. You should be proud!
Penny
Hi Sparky,
ReplyDeleteWow. You've created a gem of a sonnet on a theme which has been seemingly exhausted by great poets and butchered by bad ones.
I'm most impressed by your use of the potential in the sonnet structure. You even divide each quatrain weaving aspects of Love: romance, hate, lust, sickness, joy, life; then sew the sonnet together with the final couplet.
For example in the first quatrain, you begin with romance "looks of your bewitching eyes" and use a perfect caesura "but then" leaving the reader hanging, waiting for a melancholy fall.
You don't settle for melancholy, though, and hit the reader with "I hate to see your face." The berevity and simplicity make it even more powerful, more of a shock.
The second stanza is similarly patterned with sickness and healing. Although I think the images could be a bit stronger. And try not to settle for an awkward rhyme like "quick." You have real talent, so if it doesn't feel right to you keep stretching.
Stanza three introduces the aspect of lust, "because when we were bound i felt alive" seems positive. In the second half of the quatrain "hate" returns because "joy" is lacking; but then "joy" rescues life: "and joy is what we need: need to survive." On it's own this line might seem stale, but you've given it "life" because of the brilliantly circular structure throughout the sonnet. This structuring really captures the whorl, the turmoil of Love.
The final couplet does everything a good couplet should.
If life is love then death is hate, I live
to use my love. is all that I can give.
You reintroduce all the parts of your theme and conclude with a well-balanced tone. The thud of "death" is surrounded by the luscious alliterative "l"s. Another excellent caesura suspends "I live" (the reader still lives and waits) "to use my love" (yeah!). Then as in the other stanzas you use a short, punchy line
"is all that i can give" which to me has a well- pitched tone of both affirmation and realism, a tinge of melancholy.
Again, I think you could work a bit harder to find really strong images, but the structure, the sound the rhythm all work to form an intelligent examination of a difficult subject.
Please do make sure you proofread carefully, especially with poetry when every word and punctuation mark is crucial. Not capitalising i/I can be a powerful expression of how that i/I feels. So we need to know if you're intentionally breaking the rules. You've seen the confusion is/It's has caused. While "is" does work colloquially it changes the tone completely. Just to play devil's advocate, I don't agree that all first lines must be capitalised; but Mr. Savage is the best judge in your case.
Thanks, Sparky. Great stuff.
pax