My first Sonnet - A painted beauty

Upon a field of scarlet rose, she lay.
Fixed and frozen, imprisoned in the dark.
Bound by the brown oak frame, forever to stay.
Pure unblemished skin, left without a mark.
Chocolate coiled hair drapes across ashen skin
Midnight blue eyes twinkle in the twilight
Lonely, a painting trapped and caught within
A saviour passes by. To save her from plight?
Gazes into waxen eyes, falls in love, deep
Two straying eyes, a link with them, but he,
strikes his chest, makes his vow; a promise to keep.
Stay by lover's side, for eternity.
That frame of scarlet rose holds not but one;
Tortured souls now together. It is done.

Comments & reviews · 12
Note: You are not logged in, but you can still leave a comment or review. Before it shows up, a moderator will need to approve your comment (this is only a safeguard against spambots). Leave your email if you would like to be notified when your message is approved.

User avatar
BlondeTwiggy
Review

Oh, I love this. I think sonnets must be hard to write, at least for me, but yours is very descriptive. I think there is a spelling error (colied? Coiled, I think), as well as a missing apostrophe in line 12. Eh, that's all I can find. I loved the metaphor of a painting. Very beautiful and tragic, good job. :]

User avatar
Swottielottie
Comment

Thanks for critting! I think I wrote this over a year ago, when I was young and immature (I still am!) It was for this homework, so I wasn't too bothered about it. Thanks a million and If I get time I'll fix the comma and stuff! XD

User avatar
BigBadBear
Review

Hello! I don't think I've ever critiqued much of your work before.

I have to tell you that this sonnet was incredibly hard to read, due to the commas. You, put, them in, very wei,rd places, and it, didn't, make much, sense at all. Commas are lifesavers. But only if you know how to use them properly.


Upon a field of scarlet rose, she lay.
Fixed and frozen, imprisoned in the dark.
Bound by the brown oak frame, forever to stay.
Pure unblemished skin, left without a mark.
Chocolate, [you don't need this comma] colied hair, [you don't need this comma] drapes across ashen skin
Midnight blue eyes twinkle in the twilight
Lonely, a painting trapped and caught within
A saviour passes by, to save her from plight?
Gazes into waxen eyes, falls in love, deep
Two eyes, they stray, a link with them, but he, [you don't need a comma here]
strikes his chest, makes his vow, [you don't need a comma here. Probably a semicolon.] a promise to keep.
Stay by lovers [should be lover's not lovers] side, [no comma here] for eternity.
The frame of scarlet rose, [no comma here] holds not but one;
Gentle souls now together, [no comma here. Put a period] it is done.


I would alter this a little bit, because by itself it makes no sense whatsoever. You have two complete phrases right here, so you have to seperate them, but not with the comma, because you go Kung Fu with them. How about this? "A saviour passes by. To save her from plight?" Even that's not perfect, but it's a little easier to understand what's going on.

You need to work on this this line a little more. "Gazes into waxen eyes, falls in love, deep" makes no sense, and breaks about a million and fourty three grammar rules. I think "falls in love, deep" is what ruins this line. It should be, "falls in love, deeply" but in order to make that sentence understandable, it would have to read "falls deeply in love". But that breaks your rhyming pattern. So I don't know what you want to do there, but some reworking must be done.

"Two eyes, they stray"? Wow. You make that so complicated, when it can just read "Two straying eyes" and everything flows a little better than before.

I think your lines are too long. I read this outloud, and the rhymes were lost because there were too many words. Read this outloud.


Upon a field of scarlet rose, she lay.
Fixed and frozen, imprisoned in the dark.
Bound by the brown oak frame, forever to stay.
Pure unblemished skin, left without a mark.


We, the readers, notice right off that this is supposed to be a rhyming poem. But we can't feel the rhyme, like we are supposed to. It's too far apart. Words all mesh together. Rhyming poems rely heavily on beats, or pulses, as we read. This has a very strange pulse, or none at all. The problem that I'm getting here is we can't hear the rhyme, because the lines are too long.

OVERALL:

It was a pretty good attempt. Not my favorite poem ever, but it was pretty good. Your rhyming is being forced, which means you rely on the rhymes, when in fact you should be more worried about the actual poem itself.

Good job, and good luck editing.

-Jared

User avatar
CrisCaraway
Review

Hey Swottielottie,(like the name)
I really, really liked your poem. It was very descriptive and reminded me of my favorite book Twilight.
I don't know why it did but there was something about the words, they were really effective. I had a clear picture of what was going on in my head as I read it.
Well done and keep writing.
C.C

User avatar
Swottielottie
Comment

Thank you :)

Shakespeare is truly great!
Sweeney Todd was awesome!

YAY! Someone who likes both those things and my work! XD

Hello there!

This was a beautiful sonnet. It was very vivid and pretty. Yeah I don't know much about Sonnet's but I do like Shakeaspeare and this is almost like him but there seems to be a lot of originality in this. I love your avi by the way, tis a great movie that was. Siggy's great too.

Cheers,
-Angel

User avatar
Swottielottie
Comment

Thanks, but this was rubbish and or some thing we had to do at school that my teacher never marked.

User avatar
kawaii_kitti Comment

Wow beautiful.

It paints a beautifuk Image.

and I am not good with poems.

User avatar
Swottielottie
Comment

Thank you! I replied to your welcome post in the welcome forum!
Glad to see your getting used to yws already!

Charlotte

User avatar
biancarayne
Comment

I don't know much about sonnets, but you've written a very beautiful, wonderfully descriptive one. The only thing I saw was that some of the commas seemed unnecessary to me. Otherwise, this was definitely good!

User avatar
Swottielottie
Comment

Thank you Jules! You comment did make me happy! I don't usuallly write love poems but I wanted to try a sonnet.

Thanks
Charlotte

Very funny signature!

Have you read Sonnet 130 by Shakespeare??

I liked this. I aint much of a poetry boff so i dont really know what to point out and stuff but i enjoyed it.

Hopefully my comment will make you happy. :D



There’s always a story. It’s all stories, really. The sun coming up every day is a story. Everything’s got a story in it. Change the story, change the world.
— Terry Pratchett