r/OCPoetry•
[deleted]

I tried a sonnet this time

Feedback Received!

[deleted]

Posted Oct 15, 2016, 6:58 PM UTC · edited

88
brenden_norwood•

These lines are so so so good! :) :

O’ hands, (the grasp of which can soften stone)

and

O' mouth, (who curls as smoke from windy flame)

The rest of the poem is beautiful as well, but those two lines stood out to me. I felt this piece flowed very well, and the rhymes were creative. There are a couple things I would consider though:

1)I like the parenthetical statements except for the one in line 5 "(sweetly press!)" I just don't really see the added value of putting it in parenthesis.

  1. I think the whole looking at the moon thing borders a little bit on cliche. I still like it though; I feel that you've added enough substance to it with the whole arches//moon pairing and how it led to the theme of impermanence.

But other than those little things, this poem was really lovely to read! This is a wonderful sonnet, well done :)

2
Gummyfail•

Thanks! i appreciate it, and I'll look at the moon and line 5!

2
TerrenceBell•

The first quatrain is beautiful. It evokes quite a tactile feeling in the poem which carries on throughout the physical descriptions. The slightly antiquated and flowery language works quite well too, particularly in this form.

The use of synecdoche is impressive. I've definitely never seen synecdoche rhymed with anything in my entire life and it's a beautiful word and well used in this. The only worry I'd have with it is that it interrupts the initial reading as it's unexpected, perhaps that's just my reading of it but I was taken by surprise by the word and lost my footing slightly. Perhaps that works though.

You do use both O' and Oh at different points in the poem. I'm not sure what the reasoning behind this is but perhaps there is one I'm missing.

Overall though great hustle. Kudos.

1
Gummyfail•

Thanks, I've been dying to use that last line for months and I p much wrote this piece as an excuse to use it
as for O and Oh
http://grammarist.com/usage/o-oh/

1
japanezerscrooge•

Lovely work--smart evocation of Shakespeare in style and allusion and, as u/TerrenceBell pointed out earlier, a very clever deployment of synecdoche as a conceit and as a word choice in the closing couplet. There are moments throughout that are not only lovely to the ear but have excellent "mouth-feel"; the chewiness and metric punch of "I wait for clutch and grip and quickened pace" was fantastic.

There were some confusing instances of syncope: for example, in "(I survey pon' a curving moon)" I believe you intended to compress "upon," in which case the apostrophe should go before "pon" rather than after. Also, as u/TerrenceBell pointed out, the distinction between Oh and O' is a bit confusing, unless you intend O' to take the place of "Of" or "On." Of the two, I believe O' is more commonly substituted for "Of." If this was your intent the lines could still stand to be clarified grammatically, but that could easily be remedied by referencing the theme of synecdoche earlier--the speaker could begin the argument by referring to parts in a general sense before speaking specifically of hands and mouths and names and feet. I'm also not sure that your punctuation choices are entirely successful (parentheticals and exclamation points), but I found this so enjoyable to read that I don't want to split hairs without being more familiar with your body of work. Thanks for posting!

1
Gummyfail•

Hey, I appreciate the critque! I'm glad the meter worked for you so well. pon' is def a typo, and I'll fix it
Your fears of the punctuation are noted (and I will see if there are better ways for me to approach it).
as for O' and Oh
http://grammarist.com/usage/o-oh/

1
JoeParrish•

Your contraction of "upon" should have the apostrophe at the front of the word ('pon, not pon'). That just pokes out pretty hard.

Reiterating, the opening quatrain is very good. The flow of the words is very natural to speak. I feel that the second quatrain did not maintain that as well. "I wait for feet to dangle off and oft/in darkly space they shine as glowing runes." << I kind of stumbled on this part a bit. A few tweaks to break up the phrases and clauses more would do much for your poem.

1
Gummyfail•

I meant for the line to be a bit twisting, but I'll re-evaluate it for sure. Thanks for the suggestions (and pon' is def a typo, sorry)

1