You allow me to stay me; so close. You always
have the right words to say; you're forever my star.
We have trust, one that others may lack; you complete
me. So true. Us together could travel so far.
You're my guardian angel. You just light up my
world. You realise when something isn't right; you're my
rock. You're always up and ready to seeing me
smile. Us together could fly so high; to the sky.
You're my knight in armour; shining bright. You're my lust
for me living. You encourage me faithfully
to remain strong. You're my backbone when I'm weak; I
thank you. Us together work so sweet; lovingly .
You know throughout hardship to support me; you're my
other half. So whatever the weather I will
be there. On the other end of the phone you're there.
We are a bond so very strong, that none can kill.
I know this is all over the place and everything but I found balancing the rhyme scheme and keeping the meter difficult. I'm attempting to redraft this one. I still need practise... :)
ReplyDeleteHi sugadust,
ReplyDeleteThanks for posting this! It seems people are finding it hard to grasp the form - but you should find it gratifying that you're succeeding better than some! There is a nice dee-dee-DUM bounce to some of these lines, such as two and nine. However, you are aware that in places the meter goes. I am sure that a bit more practice will refine this, as you've demonstrated that you are more than capable of writing in anapests. I also like how you've really used the anapests singsong quality with that repeated refrain of 'us together...'
So, a really good attempt at the form. However, I think your poetic content could use some work here. Reading through, I picked out a fair few romantic cliches in this poem - 'guardian angel', 'light up my world', 'you're my rock', 'you're my knight in armour', 'you're my other half', 'whatever the weather'...
The joy of writing is it defamiliarises the world - it makes ideas like love and romance and comradeship new, and you are filled again with the feeling of why these things are so good in the first place. But cliches are phrases that are so normalised that they have lost any of their original meaning. They don't have any emotional impact or create any mental image, not unless you re-contextualise or twist them. To make a love poem work, you either have to do this, or reject cliche all together. I know I've said it before, but I think one of the strongest ways to defamiliarise the world - to make things new - is to really root your images in the concrete, rather than than the abstract, and to show, not tell. For a quick example of a poem that deftly handles the showing vs. telling divide, you could do worse than Google for Thom Gunn's 'The Hug'. Your poem deals very much in abstractions; I'd like to see your eye for telling details directed towards SHOWING how the narrator has been supported through hardship, SHOWING how the narrator & partner work together.
I hope that advice is helpful. Merry Christmas!
Hi,
ReplyDeleteYou've so nearly got this metre, so I'm just going to go through with suggestions that would make it more metrically tight. Feel free to ignore these suggestions if you hate them!
"You allow me to stay here, so close. And you always
Have something to say; you're forever my star."
Grammatical point: line 4 should be "we together".
Line 6: "And you realise when something's not right..."
Line 7: "You are always so ready to see me..."
Line 8: "We", not "us", again. And "fly up", for two syllables, perhaps?
Line 9/10: "You're my knight in bright armour; my lust / For this life..."
Line 11: "stay" fits better than "remain", and lose "I'm" to have "my backbone when weak" - that works.
There are a couple more lurking round, but otherwise this is a good poem, with a touching narrative voice. Well done, and happy Christmas!
Penny