Shadow Dancing

First poem after a long break. Be gentle, but firm.

**

NOTE: THIS IS DRAFT 2!

On the wall, two shadows stand staggered
In the silence of the eleventh hour,
Our cigarettes crackle with each inhalation
In-rhythm, we stand silent
One shadow presses the cement wall,
Its back curved, a perfect S
The other, broad shouldered,
Steps forward and merges with the other silhouette
This speaks louder than our words
His blue eyes catch mine
And my breath stops, breaks our beat
Suddenly its like I'm standing ankle deep in freezing cold water
The smoke from my Black stings my eyes, but I can't look away
I could stand there all night, the moon over head
Eyes and shadows stuck
The smell of cloves on our skin

Your imagery is lovely and I love your use of sibilance. You convey the scene really vividly. I'd puntuate a bit more, and also break some of teh lines up so it's more pleasing to the eye. I hope you don't mind me playing with it, but I figure it's easier to show rather than tell in this instance;



"On the wall, two shadows stand staggered
In the silence of the eleventh hour,
our cigarettes crackle with each
in-rhythm inhalation.
One shadow stands, its back curved,
a perfect S
The other, broad shouldered,
steps forward and merges
with the other silhouette;
This speaks louder than our words.
His blue eyes catch mine and feel suddenly
like I'm standing ankle deep
in freezing cold water .
The smoke from my Black
stings my eyes, but I can't look away .
I could stand there all night, the moon over head
Eyes and shadows stuck,
The smell of clove on our skin."

The layout still doesn't look quite right to me...hmmm...I'll leave it to you to play around with.

I love;

"In the silence of the eleventh hour, our cigarettes crackle with each in-rhythm inhalation",

and

"ankle deep in freezing cold water",
though I think you could afford to cut either "cold" or "freezing".

I think that;
"I can't look away "

"speaks louder than our words"

"eyes catch mine"

and

"could stand there all night"

are a little weak and cliche, so I'd suggest omitting them and trying something else.

The last line is effective.

Overall this is a vivid and interesting piece, which flows well.

I liked this a lot, the idea is beautiful and some of the imagery is very powerful.
What I liked best was the last two lines:

"Eyes and shadows stuck
The smell of clove on our skin"

That just worked out beautifully.

At some places, it did not seem to flow quite right and some phrases are a bit of a cliche (as it has been pointed out), but generally a very good piece.
The scene and the details were great (especially as it is rather short) and well thought out.

Well done

First off, is it without punctuation for a poetic purpose? (I see commas but no full stops)

"in-rhythm inhalation" sounds slightly strange I'm not sure exactly if it works; The meaning itself is clear but the phrasing doesn't sound right.

"The smoke from my Black" I'm not sure what this means.

I'm slightly confused overall as to the general meaning of the poem, or its direction.

The eleventh hour to start, followed by the mention of shadows on the wall throws off the strange idea I had towards the end that this was in someway Vampiric.

I could stand there all night, the moon over head
Eyes and shadows stuck
The smell of clove on our skin

The mention of clove is what put me onto that train of thought and as I'm writing this I'm thinking that sounds ridiculous.

So, really, I have no idea what this is about. It just confused me. If you feel like enlightening me drop me and PM and I'll take a second look at this and see if I can properly review it.

This earns a star in my book for it's enchanting reality, if you catch my drift. I'm going to forget that it has little direction or backbone, simply because I believe the way you paint the nostalgic scene in itself is a thing to be championed; I adore the imagery because I can picture so clearly in my head.

I liked this bit the most probably:

our cigarettes crackle

Because it's real. Oh, a got i tingle up my spine and all.

I also liked the way you deviated from the strict poetry set of rules and strayed away from the 'norm' which has become so boring. All the senses were engaged and the prose aspect to it adds a sense of freedom to your words.

The other, broad shouldered, steps forward and merges with the other silhouette

A kiss? If so, nicely dealt with.

Man oh man is this good:

His blue eyes catch mine and feel suddenly like I'm standing ankle deep in freezing cold water

My diagnosis? It's great. I'd like to see a second draft.

Eimear

WOW. I really love this poem. It's really dark and mystic. Great job.

Draft 2!

To address a couple of concerns:

Punctuation-
I ignored periods on purpose because I wanted the piece to be one long image, not a series of smaller ones. To that effect, I'm aware that its just a picture. I don't feel like it needs direction or purpose, I'm simply narrating a scene from my life, nothing more.

Content-
The word "Black" here refers to Djarum Blacks, which are cigarettes made of tobacco and cloves. Its what I smoke.

**

On the wall, two shadows stand staggered
In the silence of the eleventh hour,
Our cigarettes crackle with each inhalation
In-rhythm, we stand silent
One shadow presses the cement wall,
Its back curved, a perfect S
The other, broad shouldered,
Steps forward and merges with the other silhouette
This speaks louder than our words
His blue eyes catch mine
And my breath stops, breaks our beat
Suddenly its like I'm standing ankle deep in freezing cold water
The smoke from my Black stings my eyes, but I can't look away
I could stand there all night, the moon over head
Eyes and shadows stuck
The smell of cloves on our skin

I like this poem, but I have to say that the structure is a bit off. I like the imagery. If I can suggest something, you should do something like E.E. Cummings and make the poem into an image (literally). Try to arrange the words and spaces into the shape of the shadows, if you can (or want to).

Posted: Fri May 16, 2008 5:25 am Post subject: Shadow Dancing

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First poem after a long break. Be gentle, but firm.



**



On the wall, two shadows stand staggered

In the silence of the eleventh hour, our cigarettes crackle with each in-rhythm inhalation- cigarettes dont crackle, i think

One shadow stands, its back curved, a perfect S

The other, broad shouldered, steps forward and merges with the other silhouette

This speaks louder than our words

His blue eyes catch mine and feel suddenly like I'm standing ankle deep in freezing cold water- good emotion

The smoke from my Black stings my eyes, but I can't look away- from my black? what is the balck

I could stand there all night, the moon over head

Eyes and shadows stuck

The smell of clove on our skin- the smell of clove? is that a perfume

other than that good job i liked this poem and like eimear said it painted a picture in my mind, yet it had a sense of mystery and alore
very good
keep trying
and remember, never give up you can do it
---Jon---

wiseman...

Thank you for the review. The cigarettes I refer to in the poem are called Djarum Black. They are known as "Blacks" in the smoking community. They contain cloves, which are a type of spice, and which crackle when they are burned. My friend and I would smoke them at school, in the middle of the night, when we would break from studying.

This is a very powerful image, I loved how you described it using the shadows and the smokes You are very talented!

The other, broad shouldered, steps forward and merges with the other silhouette

I loved this line. Great job!

One grammatical thing:

His blue eyes catch mine and I feel suddenly like I'm standing ankle deep in freezing cold water

The word 'feel' in this context modifies 'He' which isn't going to make sense. Other than that though, I can't find any complaints, though I think I should mention that I, like another reviewer, found it odd that you didn't add any end-punctuations, but after reading through your explanation, I sort of agree with you. It would probably be best to paint this as one image.

Great job overall. Keep writing!

~ Audrey

i like your story it is very good. I'm not just saying that either. i like your vocabulary in it and the way you say that even though the smoke is stinging your eyes, you still stare. it shows consistency and how the character really wants to look.