Published October 14, 2011
Deva Diana Arlecchina
Watery moon, a-waxing
(soft in) the bright waning sky —
will you erupt in ruby
ablaze torching the stars,
or watch in pale livery aloof?
Affection none do you give man,
save thy fickle indignation, indicating Affectation
born of breeding-met desire
inside the slumbering lotus flower.
The which of these you truly feel
is oft a time by clouds concealed,
your veilèd dress of somber court
discarded ere the hunting sport, wherein
the nettled tides obey, easing back to pin your prey
across, beneath, and past the baying dunes laid bare;
these cower ere the time must come,
when hunting done you do recall your hounds
and let the waves once more, consuming, fall.
Arlecchina, how is't you present such
duplicitous faces with(out) a masque?
Your coloring so variates as still
to censor men's good wisdom wherein they
try vainly to attain to thy good face,
and yet the favor so professed by thee
in naked thoughts resides apart the realm
where masculinity may lie untouched.
Nude the mind while armored soul and body,
defense redundant after godly guise
and guise is your great tragicomic act:
a layered face, within, within, within
Matryoshka doll your heavens-gracing skin.
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Alright. I should preface this by saying that I am a complete novice when it comes to poetry, so please excuse any clueless comments or questions.
First, I agree with Dreamwalker; the first stanza didn't appeal to me. I understand that it's difficult to come up with new ways to say age-old things, but it just didn't hit the same note that a lot of the other parts did. You have a great vocabulary (as everyone and his brother has already said), and it would be nice to see that right off the bat.
Now this part...
...Is great. Fantastic imagery, a solid message. Effective personification.
Overall, very well-written. A little word-heavy at times, but I believe that's something you can get away with in good poetry. I commend you for the use of 'ere'. Haven't seen that in a while.
For lack of a better term, this had texture. It did actually bring to my mind night shores, the full sensory effect (even though I have never actually been to a shore).
Well done. Keep on writing.
This is... well, structured, if anything. A very old-english style voice so the modern way in which you stylized the structure is kind of off-balanced.
Now, I'm sure you don't need me to tell you that your vocabulary is gorgeous. A strong diction equals to a strong writer, usually, and its quite easy to fake it when you know words like duplicitous and affectation. Unfortunately, if you give this poem to someone who does understand the words, they don't fall for it quite as well as someone who wouldn't.
Which brings me to my first point. You jump the cliche gun quite a bit in this. For example;
A classic case of using pretty words and interesting diction to take the initial sting away from the fact that you're talking about the sky. And the sky is very very over-used. When we think about poetry, we think about strange connections. Interesting connections. Ones in which we, as writers, make without needing to overbear the reader with old-English short forms and expansive diction switches. If anything, it almost because jammed up and clammy with the use of diction, so any chance of flow is cut off by the thickness and the fullness of this.
By big problem with this lies within the style. Or, well, how quick you were to jump into a skin rather than writing something truly, deeply passionate. This felt disconnected, as if you knew what you wanted to do and instead of getting caught up in the moment, got caught up in a bought of pretty descriptions and 'thee's' and 'thy's'. Try something a little less 1600's and we may have something interesting on our hands.
As it goes, I do like how sensual this felt. Sort of dark and remorseful, but visceral nonetheless. Which was interesting to read and interesting to try and relate to. Its got those lively undertones that make poetry so attuned to shocking as well as enlightening. So, in that, you did well.
This was pretty good, diction wise. Now, lets see you try writing something a little more modern and a little more powerful.
~Walker
Hey,
I thought this was a very good poem, it was hard to read at parts because your (great) vocabulary use, for my age, I didn't understand what you meant, though for the poem, obviously for older readers, was a great piece of writing.
is oft a time- I am not sure whether this is supposed to say Of and not Oft but again, it could be a word I have still not got round to learning yet.
Your poem, great as it is, like the person said before me, I didn't get the story. It, to me, didn't have a story, maybe you overused your vocabulary slightly. If you put more words in there, especially the younger people, may understand better, then maybe we might be able to delve deeper into the story,
Apart from that, a great lovely piece of writing :)
EvensLily x
Can I just say? That your vocabulary is stunning! You used different variations/synonyms of words and used them effectively in the poem! To be honest, I had to grab a dictionary. xD There no grammar or spelling problems I spotted and if there were, I didn't catch them.
I was just wondering though, what exactly is the poem about? Is it about a young woman or a girl named Deva? I couldn't really interpret it very well, maybe because my vast knowledge of vocabulary failed to meet yours. Nonetheless, this is still a beautiful and amazing piece. Can't wait to read more of your works! ^^
~Disenchanted. Out.