Thanks for sharing this nonet poem concerning a girl who bravely leads the way down a stairwell but suddenly loses courage after hearing the boards creak. I like the subject of this poem because I underwent a similar experience after which being in the darkness became unbearable.
I like the way the poem describes the reasons for her initial confidence. She notices how solid the stairway is as someone, referred to as a he, walks on them. With the benefit of light she decides to lead the way. Based on the poem’s title I rightfully expected darkness to suddenly arrive for some reason. Yet, the only thing we are told is that there was a creak and that the girl spoke about blackness biting and then we are told she is scarred.
Since the poem is in the nonet form I had to test the syllable count according to the following rules.
Nonet Poems: The Rules
The nonet poetic form is simple.
It’s a 9-line poem
9 syllables in the first line,
8 syllables in the second line,
7 syllables in the third line, and continues to count down to
one syllable in the final (ninth) line.
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The following compares the poem to the rules.
9. The creaky wood beneath his feet is [9]
8. solid as oaks amidst the wood [8]
7. and she ran down ahead so [7]
6. sure with light to lead the [6]
5. way. Black Bites, she screams [5]
4. [W]e laugh, amused [4]
3. But she is [3]
2. scarred [1]
1. now. [1]
So line eight falls short by one syllable.
Here is one way to fix it.
2. scarred = [1]
2. so scarred = [2]
Scarred has one syllable, and scarring has two syllables. For counting syllables, I would recommend the tapping method where you tap something. Your foot would do fine. When reading a word, a syllable is a unit of spoken language that has an uninterrupted sound. The website that has the definition of syllable is below.
Source(s):
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/syllable
Other Suggestions
The word “wood” is singular whereas the word “were” is plural.
The creaky [boards] beneath his feet [felt]
[The creak indicated otherwise?]
solid as [the] oaks amidst the [woods]
[You re referring to a forest-right?
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/woods]
[as] she ran down ahead so
[certain] with light to lead the
way.
[“]Black Bites,[”] she [screamed.]
[W]e laugh, amused
but she is
scarred
now.
Please note the without the explanation a reader will conclude that she actually suffered a real bite and has been literally scarred.
Looking forward to reading more of your work.
BTW
You can expand this poem by using adding another nonet as a second stanza. Also, if I included any ad=vice contrary to the nonet syllable count it was because at first I was not evaluating it as a nonet. So please ignore it.
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