an esquisse of the sun

oh my. simply beautiful. i have tears in my eyes. it was so simple and touching
Best imagery ever. i have nothing to say but praise. each stanza evoked something really beautiful
was this inspired by a real boy? i really want to meet this boy now. and i want to meet you! you're a great writer

To be perfectly honest, the first line pulled me in. Not because it had anything to do with me, but because it immediately gave me an image and a connection to hang onto for the rest of the poem. At this point, you can tell me pretty much anything else about this world created in the next few stanzas and I won't click away from your poem. All because of a good opening.

I don't know if that's any indication of anything or not, but it works for me.

Further on in the stanza, I'm not so sure about the "joy dancing out of your skin" but I really like the "water dripping down like molten silver from your hands". I'm also not sure about the rainbows in the fourth stanza, just because everything else has been fairly immediate and concrete (even the hawks and the molten silver had this sense that they might be right next to you, albeit uncommon).

I like how the ending doubled back on itself, tone-wise, to re-address the boy after reminiscing for so long. Ideally, I'd love to find a stronger thread connecting the sequence of the middle stanzas, but all in all this is very nicely done =)

(and you get brownie points for building my French vocab with the title)

Hey there, luv. Great job!

First Impression: Oh! What a perfectly romantic poem! Like a lovely tragic little picture I fell into, for a minute experiencing the beauty and then pain of another's life. True tragedy isn't a morbid atrocity, but the loss of the memories and the joy that was brought by what was loss. Remember... And what a bright and magical world it was, a child's world...or the memories of a child's world. Our paradise lost, back, cupped in my hands. The world even sparkles different when we are small or with the small in their own world. If you somehow didn't mean to capture this, I'd be surprised. You've done a wonderful job with this. Good job! I love it.

Another thing I really liked was the relationship between the poem and its title. It was clever, and whimsical, without being to pushy and heavy on the word play with it.

Break Down:

- Because your poem reads beauty, except for some puntuation stumbling blacks. If I didn't write anything besides it, I think it's unnecessary; if I wrote something, replace.

you have always been a handsome boy, laughing glad and
golden under the afternoon sun or stumbling sheepish and smiling
by the stairs to the kitchen, joy dancing out of your skin and
water dripping down like molten silver from your hands;

last summer we lost your name to the placid breeze, so we
called you robin-red and teased the hawks out of their nests;
your hair caught the light and trembled like fireflies at night,
and we ran after you to hear you shout at the sky;

your voice rose up like a waterfall thundering backwards,
and it was a victory over space and time. <-- make this a comma later we walked
home and blew bubbles of soap into the crisp evening air,
waved them goodbye and watched them drift away.

there were rainbows from the water we’d sent across the sky,
and smaller ones swirling at your fingertips, soap-slick
and wet and just as beautiful as you. <-- make this a semi-colon it was summer and the
colors danced over your arms and the sun never set -

oh you with eyes like spring rain and a mouth like autumn
leaves, oh you quicksilver and swallowflight suspended in
a drop of morning dew; <-- make this a coma with a name like the trickling of streams
on washed stones under the sun,make this a semi-colon oh, you. <-- make this a coma how i miss you.


~*~

Other than that, I really thought it perfectly satisfying, and complete.

Keep writing!
At your service,
Mandorelute
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So, I meant to review this some time ago. We're going on a bit of a 'sun' theme, by the looks of your latest works - or their titles, at the very least - is that right? (Oh, and please PM me when you post - I enjoy looking over your work).

I love an utter lack of capitals. No word is made more important than another that way, no single letter looms over the rest. It's cute and it's intimate, and I think that was the effect you were trying to achieve in the first place. It sort of hooks you and strings you along linearly rather than bumping up and down like capitals mixed in with lower case. Just thought to mention that, since noncapitalisation is a technique I've seen used very often for that very purpose.

I get the feeling this is a very personal poem - it may not be, of course, but the way it is written makes me believe it's real to the writer, even if it's not, if that makes sense. What I am thus finding it harder to do, is to separate the narrator of the poem from the writer - you. But I'll try.

I'll state the overall impression I had of it first. I found it excessively pleasant, almost too happy, perhaps even bordering on the cliche with the images, even when they seemed original. I think it was the synonymous language used throughout - laughing, glad, smiling and joy; and handsome, golden, and sun also in the first stanza. The rest were decidedly similar, and for me, it ruined the effect of the rare piece of vivid imagery I did see - such as 'water dripping down like molten silver.' I'd suggest to cut it down, shave it till the barest bones of it remain, and build it up from there, subtly. I feel like I'm getting teh beautiful, bright, golden, happy, smiling sun shoved down my throat - not a nice feeling. Let one word speak for itself, leave an aura of mystery and leave the reader to use their own imagination to draw connections - overuse of synonyms, or similar ideas is not something I enjoy reading.

you have always been a handsome boy, laughing glad and
golden under the afternoon sun or stumbling sheepish and smiling
by the stairs to the kitchen, joy dancing out of your skin and
water dripping down like molten silver from your hands;

last summer we lost your name to the placid breeze, so we
called you robin-red and teased the hawks out of their nests;
your hair caught the light and trembled like fireflies at night,
and we ran after you to hear you shout at the sky;

your voice rose up like a waterfall thundering backwards,
and it was a victory over space and time. later we walked
home and blew bubbles of soap into the crisp evening air,
waved them goodbye and watched them drift away.

there were rainbows from the water we’d sent across the sky,
and smaller ones swirling at your fingertips, soap-slick
and wet and just as beautiful as you. it was summer and the
colors danced over your arms and the sun never set -

oh you with eyes like spring rain and a mouth like autumn
leaves, oh you quicksilver and swallowflight suspended in
a drop of morning dew; with a name like the trickling of streams
on washed stones under the sun, oh, you. how i miss you

Heya Jagged
Here to review as requested, 'cause I is cool.

I'm not the best when it comes to reviewing poetry, but I'll try my best to do so. You've also got two other good reviews, so I won't repeat what they've already said!

You have always been a handsome boy, laughing glad and
golden under the afternoon sun or stumbling sheepish and smiling
by the stairs to the kitchen. Joy dancing out of your skin and
water dripping down like molten silver from your hands.

Last summer we lost your name to the placid breeze, so we
called you robin-red and teased the hawks out of their nests;
your hair caught the light and trembled like fireflies at night,
and we ran after you to hear you shout at the sky.

your voice rose up like a waterfall thundering backwards,
and it was a victory over space and time. Later we walked
home and blew bubbles of soap into the crisp evening air,
waved them goodbye and watched them drift away.

There were rainbows from the water we’d sent across the sky,
and smaller ones swirling at your fingertips, soap-slick
and wet and just as beautiful as you. It was summer and the
colors danced over your arms and the sun never set -

oh you with eyes like spring rain and a mouth like autumn
leaves, oh you quicksilver and swallowflight suspended in
a drop of morning dew; with a name like the trickling of streams
on washed stones under the sun, oh, you. How I miss you.

Hey there! I'm here to review your poem.

I have to say that this was beautiful. It has great imagery and I like your choice of words.

Some nitpicks:

Jagged wrote:and we ran after you to hear you shout at the sky:

Jagged wrote:and wet and, like you, beautiful. it was summer and the

Jagged wrote:oh you with eyes like spring rain and a mouth like autumn

I'm in love with this poem. It's simply beautiful - the way you put everything together, every detail enamored with a metaphor or a simile, from the title until the end. It gave me this vision of a person that you have met one summer afternoon, and how you miss his presence when he's not around. Instead, you wander in your memories associated with him and that particular summer. I could relate to this poem as well because I am an immigrant that travels back to her homeland during the summer; I think that the fundamental focus when writing poetry is to give a glimpse of something beautiful and courageous as this to your audience - it's that vague, short boundary between experiencing the exact same thing that the author gave the reference to, and knowing that somewhere in your past you have had similar feelings towards this specific thing. Does it make sense? All in all, you have great discipline in your poem, and versatile language. Can't do nothing but praise this piece. Kudos to you!