Description: For Crow, and her inspiration. Not sure if its exactly what your looking for, but i spent considerable time trying to get the diction of it right. Its supposed to sound macabre and quixotic when read aloud. Kind of the theme i was going for. The wraith is meant to symbolise willpower, or the lack there of. Hope you like it Crow!
A Home Held Abreast by Nature -------------------------------------------
A curious hallows eve twilight
So I wandered, wispy as a wight
Black wraith followed in my widow wake
To watch what mischief I could make.
For I was two sheets to the wind,
My painless conscious less chagrinned.
To make of me what making must--
My sense of justice more unjust.
A home I found, all bleak and grim
Held abreast only by nature’s whim.
As curiosity makes the feline purr
In like, it made my wraith defer.
Up to the door I staggered/ wandered
“What hermit must live here?” I pondered.
With a thump I fell against a door-
Oiled to odd weights nevermore.
To this precipice of dust--
So my wraith wed me to his black lust
Of shadow stretched across the plane
Of this dark house on this dark lane.
Some evil soul within me woke--
Some ill device inside me spoke--
It told me to make for me a load
Of loot well held in this abode.
But no further did I put in
My body to the room I stood in
When the shock of my next blurry sight
Sent my wraith from me in fright.
It was a man in silhouette
Who seemed as scared as me we’d met.
He was hideous, and his soul was broke--
Some fear of God within me woke.
It pushed me back and pushed me hard
Back out the door, through the front yard.
To run away in mortal fright
To the comforting arms of mother night.
Now as years have gone and come
My fear has begun to subside some
Looking back I now can tell
I was fooled by my wraith from hell
For in my drunken state I missed
An obviousness I had dismissed
But knowing now helps not at all--
I’d beheld a mirror on the wall.
wow. another of your poems that is truly, truly great. the rhyme scheme... you're my freakin' idol! not only were the rhymes at the end of the lines good, but the syllables and such between the lines flowed well also. this was amazing.
Okay, you still have it old friend. You are gifted and i've always said that. this is great work all of this Poe-ism style placed well with in the capable hands of your talent and in just you have done yourself justice again. the ending is brilliant. but so are all of your endings as i remember. and nature is not as wilderness but as your own nature in matters. you never hold back and you thrill me once again. Thank you friend.
Oooh, I loved it! It's brilliant, Q! I could just imagine you wandering into that old house...tres uber brill, or Tub, as I say. I love the bit with the mirror, too! There really is one in my great grams old house and it scared the fudge right out of me the first time I saw it too. You did a brilliant job, and it's fantastic. Really did it justice. Luff yous much, Q darlin, keep on writing! ~Sicobe R. Crow
Holy cocktail batman, this was great (to say the least)! This was a great piece and I can honestly say I enjoyed reading it:O) Your rhyming was so amazing compared to the little rhyming I have been able to conquer, I'm jealous.
The piece, overall was very good. At first I will say I had a hard time reading it, but I was into the piece a bit more it became easier and easier by the second. There is only ONE thing that slightly, I felt, threw off your rhyme and that was here:
"It was a man in silhouette Who seemed as scared as me we’d met. He was hideous, and his soul was broke- Some fear of God within me woke."
The second line is terribly hard to read and a syllable off, but at the same time I have no suggestions for a change. Once the reader is done the piece, that line is a bit clearer, but while reading its kinda a bump in the road. But anyway, the reason I reposted that whole stanza was to give you kudos on the last two lines. AMAZING. My favourite by far.
First off, that last line is great, really sent a shiver up my spine. I love it when a poem comes around and ends up saying so much more than you were expecting it to.
I will say that this poem is far too structured for me. I'm not a fan of rhyming couplets because you end up having to force the lines to rhyme, and I'd say there are a fair few lines here that do sound forced, like they've been constructed around getting the rhyme at the end.
That said, if I'm reading this right, then you've done it for a reason, and the reason is that this is supposed to reflect a lot of traditional macabre poetry, like the work of Mr Poe. It was that last line in the 4th stanza that confirmed that for me.
Still, I think this could have done with a bit more work to make some of the lines sound less constructed. Someone once said to me that there are so many words in the English language that, if you look hard enough and are prepared to change the odd line or word, anything can be made to rhyme comfortably. Don't know if I agree with him, but I certainly think it's a possiblity.
Let me just pick a few examples out to help you see what I mean.
In like, it made my wraith defer.
This one's actually a really good example, because 'defer' is a word people don't normally use in poetry unless it's to make a rhyme. Also, watch out for changing the word order in lines to make the last word rhyme, again, this line illustrates this for me.
On a lighter note, I really loved the use of 'curious' here:
A curious hallows eve twilight
And the phrase 'widow-wake' also in the first stanza. Really innovative use of language. The kind of thing I love to see in poetry.
I also really loved:
To this precipice of dust-
'Precipice of dust' is wonderful, again, a really interesting twist of language.
And at last I've found someone that punctuates and uses capitalization on the initial letters in lines! Well done, I guess with a lot of people writing these days, they ignore these poetic conventions. They say a workman's only as good as his tools, and our tool is lanuage, so it drives me mad when people put themselves above it. That said, you don't have many commas in there, so you may want to look at using them as well as full stops and hyphens.
All in, a very atmospheric piece, and the other people that have commented are right, the imagry is really potent stuff. Nice going.
Submission Name: A Home Held Abreast by Nature
I love the bit with the mirror, too! There really is one in my great grams old house and it scared the fudge right out of me the first time I saw it too. You did a brilliant job, and it's fantastic. Really did it justice. 