Life
A blooming rose is blowing in the breeze.
The night is old and ending really fast.
The shadows soon appear beneath the trees
And sunshine gleams. With beauty unsurpassed
It shines its light. The morning has begun.
The sun set is as beautiful as you,
None can compare. White as snow like a swan
My love to you is so great and so true.
The rainbow is now full, all colours here
Your smile attracts me in every way
You are my life and so you are my dear
Now my life starts with you right now, today.
The world is a wonderful place, you see
I am here. You and me will always be.
Death
The river weeps of sorrow and bleeds blood,
The sun died and the world is at an end
The whispers in my ear scare me but flood
My brain with wanted information. Dead.
The leaves on the trees turn evil. Dark, black.
No body knowes how it happens. Power,
Takes control on our actions we lack.
Leaves drop dead. Even things like a flower,
Die. Nothing moves, nothing breathes, death is here
Life can no longer exist, without you
My mind is full of hectic thoughts. I fear,
I fear my life has come to an end too.
We all were young once and now we are old
We shall wait for a new light to unfold.
As your first attempt at a wordvoodoo sonnet this task asked a lot of you, and you’ve made a good effort. You seem to be growing comfortable with iambic pentameter, although there are still some glitches. A few examples include:
ReplyDeleteSonnet one, line seven: to fit the iambic pentameter, your sonnet demands the pronunciation ‘white AS snow LIKE a SWAN’, whereas the more natural rhythm would be ‘WHITE as SNOW LIKE a SWAN’.
Sonnet one, line eight: ‘SO great AND so TRUE’, compared to the more natural ‘so GREAT and so TRUE’.
Sonnet one, lines twelve and fourteen: here, your emphasis wrongly falls on the first syllable of the line, ‘Now’ and ‘I’, respectively.
It’s tricky, but you will get the hang of it! You get it right far more often than not – now it’s just a case of practice makes perfect. Also, look out for syllable counts, as line seven of sonnet two only has nine syllables (you probably should have picked this up yourself). This brings me to my final point: please make sure to proof your work before posting (there are a couple of typos: ‘sun set’, ‘knowes’, and a few dodgy bits of punctuation).
There are some vivid, original images in these sonnets. I particularly liked ‘The rainbow is now full, all colours here’ – a lovely way of describing the fullness of a happy life, although it did seem to conflict slightly with your previous images of whiteness – and the fantastic final couplet of the second sonnet. I’d like to see you pushing yourself to continue working in this more inventive vein. A couple of places that could benefit from some more creative thought: could ‘really fast’ be phrased differently? ‘Rapidly’? ‘Swiftly’? Or even a more exciting simile or metaphor? ‘White as snow like a swan’ gives the reader two similes in quick succession: if you cut this to just one, it may be more powerful and striking. ‘White as snow’ is a cliché, so I’d go for (some variation on) ‘white like a swan’. Finally, could you avoid so many repetitions on variations of the word ‘death’ in the second sonnet?
These sonnets may have benefitted from having a stronger dialogue between each other; for example, the images in the second sonnet playing on/with images used in the first could make ‘Death’ more of an answer or riposte to ‘Life’. Individually, each sonnet could be stronger if they had more of a journey – even an argument – going across the fourteen lines. If you look at classical Shakespearean sonnets, they often take this argumentative form, which helps to give the poem a really solid structure.
In conclusion, this was an admirable first effort. By carefully reading Mr. S’s instructions, by close reading work by other poets (famous and not so famous!), and by carefully proofing your own work, your sonnet writing skills will come on no end.
(...continued)
ReplyDeleteHOWEVER, for the most part, I was really impressed with your attempt at iambic pentameter. The first four lines are PERFECT, for example. I felt, though, that the iambic pentameter was slightly better in the first sonnet than in the second. For example, ending a line with 'Dark, black' is a little sloppy as it is obvious that both these words demand emphasis.
Before we were saying how you needed to create a sense of flow between the two poems. However, you also need to create a sense of flow WITHIN the poems. Make sure that you aren't throwing in words just to fit with the subscribed rhythm. One example: "bleeds blood" - you don't need the word "blood" because it is already implied by the word "bleeds". The image of white snow/swan is another thing that needs to be tightened (choose one image, not both), and although the lines about the rainbow colours are beautiful, they don't 'flow' from the previous image of whiteness.
Next time, to push yourself a little further, I think you could think more about the octave/sestet split. I felt that there really were two distinct parts to these poems: the images of life/death and the effect of love. I think you could separate the poem so that the images are at the beginning, and then we get the emotional link at the end.
I was impressed with your use of enjambment and caesura. I particularly likes the enjambment of 'beneath the trees/ sunshine gleams' as this creates a half-rhyme in the middle of the line. Really good stuff.
Both poems were full of powerful imagery - very suitable for such overwhelming subjects. Overall I think you did really well. Next time you need to:
- focus on getting the rhythms totally right, without letting it effect the flow of the poem
- try to create an octave/sestet split
- think about how the two poems could relate more to each other. How can they create a conflicting argument?
Overall, good work.
ps. Next time, could you please not use coloured fonts as I can't copy an paste examples from your work so it makes it a bit tricky.
Hi Smart Flame, welcome back to WordVooDoo. You're stuck with me as one of your moderators again ;) Well done on completing the first task - it was a tough one.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to start by saying that I agree with all of the points that Sarah has made. I think her point about perhaps creating a stronger dialogue between the two poems is particularly important, and will add an extra element of sophistication to your work. You had a few over-lapping elements, such as the natural images of the sun and flowers, but I think the link could have been stronger.
You've successfully managed the rhyme scheme of a sonnet; you've got 14 lines; and you've attempted iambic pentameter with a degree of success. So well done. Again, as Sarah has pointed out, it is the iambic pentameter which needs the most work.
A few example I picked out as I read:
You wrote: Your smile attracts me in every way
Iambically: your SMILE a-TTRACKS me IN ev-ER-ry WAY
The main problem here is the 'me IN' rhythm, which to my ear should be the other way around. Another point to remember is that some words are spoken differently to how they might appear on the page. Most people pronounce 'EV-ry' (2 syllables), and would not put the emphasis in the 'ER' in the middle as I have demonstrated above. This kind of thing is perhaps slightly subjective, and lots of poets do get away with bending the pronunciation of words, but I think the best way to deal with this is to use your ears, not your head!
You wrote: Now my life starts with you right now, today
Iambically: now MY life STARTS with YOU right NOW to-DAY
That really doesn't sounds right. Not only that, but I felt this was the weakest line of the first poem - the repetition of 'now' with the use of 'today' is not needed, and is repeating the same point three times. It seems you've tried to hard to create 10 syllables without thinking about the flow of your poem. Try playing around with word order. e.g.
my LIFE be-GINS with YOU right HERE right NOW
(obviously that wouldn't fit with the rhyme scheme, but that's something else you would have to think about)
You wrote: I am here. You and me will always be.
Iambically: i AM here. YOU and ME will AL-ways BE.
The only problem is the first three words. The rest is perfect.
(continued...)
Thank you for all your comments I am sure they will be very useful- This was my first ever time coming across sonnets and Iambic Pentameter, but the comments that you have made have been very useful- I won't write in colour anymore :-)
ReplyDeleteThank you.