Morning drags the round, white sun
Up to kiss the frozen earth,
To meet the hills between their summits
And lick the pines from slumbering root
To skeletal crown. Further still
Across the ashen sky as day advances,
Dripping pallid light like melted wax
upon the cold, cold world.
Evening descends as does the sun,
Its face red and swollen
Like exposed and freezing flesh,
On cheeks, on fingers, on breasts.
Nightfall carries the cruelest chill,
The numbness of a plummeting degree
Soothing tired limbs, staining skin
And aching muscle with a creeping stain of black
Like the drying dregs of an old ink well.
Over the edge of one high cliff,
Below boulders powdered with windswept snow,
Great gray waves foaming white and angry
Lap at a beach of polished pebbles,
Glistening like icy tears.
The waves, they roar with a hollow rush,
Like a chorus formed from the dying and dead,
Their roar carrying Warmth's requiem
Up on the wind to the throbbing ears of
Two lost runaways.
Those dying princesses
That had wandered months the harsh wastelands
Between their kingdoms and some beautiful,
Beckoning
Unknown.
Fighting, freezing, fading, it was only a matter of time
Before they arrived here,
To this,
To the end of the world.
Words with frosted, engraved edges,
Pass between them in mechanical formations like
Migratory birds cutting across the sky.
Familiar, anonymous, synchronized,
Faint.
The future extends only as far as their sight,
As far as a skeletal hand,
As far as a fire's smoke rises.
Amidst trees like iron spires piercing
Through the earth from the rooftops
Of a buried palace,
A tent, a circle of civilization, shivers
In the wind, illuminated from within
Like a rice-paper lantern.
So fragile.
A circle of heat and comfort to die away,
Die out with the darkness.
They hold each other.
They savor the heat of a soft stomach,
The steam of a breath, a kiss.
Darling, can you hear the snow falling,
The waves crashing,
The stars?
She whispers prayers and filament dreams,
And she replies with fading sighs.
Her lungs are filled with ice,
And her limbs have lost all feeling.
Morning carries a frosted sun
Up on the backs of clouds stained yellow,
And echo of bone, exposed teeth.
Hanging, a halo without shoulders to bear it,
The sun's rays seep into the fissures
In ice and stone and bark and girl,
Warming and melting.
A slow decay
Of porcelain winter and cold blue skin.
Like rivers running black beneath
A crystalline sheen of broken ice,
Their blood freezes in their veins
This is Demoness speaking!!! I've come to give this piece my opinion... and adore it a little cause well, it deserves it
Soo.. I must begin with telling you what an amazing writer you are because when I looked at the length of this piece I just though. OH-NO! But then I started reading and it was over waaaaaay too quick! You have a very, VERY great imagery and imaginary and all and your stanzas are great, the flow and rythm was amazing and yeh.. It was lovable.
My favorite stanza was this one, even though the first and last one really tied the whole thing together beautifully aswell!
I saw this really good story develop within this poem and if you don't write it maybe I will!! Tzz, Naah but really.. you should do it because there's alot to go on in this little piece of poetry.
Well, I think that was it, maybe I wasn't very helpful but you got a fan and a follower atleast
Good Luck & Keep Writing
// Demoness
Whoa. That's all I can say. This poem was fantastic. My favorite stanza was:
Morning drags the round, white sun
Up to kiss the frozen earth,
To meet the hills between their summits
And lick the pines from slumbering root
To skeletal crown. Further still
Across the ashen sky as day advances,
Dripping pallid light like melted wax
upon the cold, cold world
I can't choose my favorite line though. I liked them all. I'll be looking for more of your poems!
Well, of COURSE I'm here for you~
So look at it this way. This poem is about watching the two princesses freeze to death. That can be beautiful. It is, for the most part, but then why do we need to watch what the sun looks like as it rises or sets and how is it relevant at all? You don't have to skip describing the sun, but make it important to the rest of what you're trying to say. Try to make everything focused, connected, relevant in whatever way.
Because I am first interested when you mention those people. At the sight of the girls, I think "oh, something will happen now". And the first time I'm really connected to your words is in this stanza:
This image is new. I've never seen it before, and I happily follow it along because it's connected with the girls. I wonder what they're saying. It's connected with the cold that will kill them: the words are frosted. It's connected with foreshadowing, giving me a reason to keep reading: the future extends only as far as their sight. That makes me want to figure out what happens in the end.
But a lot of your poem is eclipsed by stilted language. It's embodied by this moment:
The rice-paper lantern is good. It gives us a specific image, a specific feeling. We see the tent, and the light, illuminated from within, we see it on the barren plane with the wind raging on it. We ALREADY KNOW that it's fragile. But because you're caught up in caressing the words, trailing them out longer like the flourishes on old-time signatures, you feel it's necessary to tell us again. Well, silly, it's not. Let your words carry their meaning. Don't coddle them. They can do things for themselves, you know. : D
What I want to say is that I like what's hiding behind this language. The image of the girls walking, talking, huddled in a tent, and then morning breaks upon them and they're frozen. But let that come out clearer. Keep the beauty of language, but also respect the power that plain words have. And, if you're feeling ambitious, add another level. Why is it important for us to watch these particular girls die? Is it because they're human, to remind us of our own mortality, or is there something specific you want us to focus on about the death. You can direct us. Show us what you want to.
I really hope this was understandable. If it's not, don't hesitate to PM me with questions. I mean it!
Hannah
Okay, here we go.
Hello. I love the imagery in this poem and I love the spoiler. I don't need to tell you that your descriptions are breathtaking because you already know; you spent the time writing them. However, I feel like you are a little too enamored with your descriptions. I've heard lectures by poets who advice that, immediately after you write a poem you should eliminate the first stanza because that was the one where you were noodling around and then in the second one you got to your point. That may not be true in all cases but this poem could stand to have a little fat cut off the edges.
If at all possible, I would reccomend that you eliminate these two pieces of each stanza and then meld stanzas two and three together. Let me explain my reasoning behind this-- there are a few tired images in these lines: black ink, powdered snow, anything being compared to tears. You need the line about the runaways and you need the metaphor about exposed flesh, because it was gorgeous.
Stanza four is perfect.
I also think you should find a way to meld stanzas five and six together; if for the sake of symmetry if nothing else. It's a hard, almost surgical thing because you mix superfluous but beautiful imagery with bits of story.
Stanza seven is perfect.
Stanza eight is pretty fantastic as well.
I know getting rid of these lines must be hard, because all of them are so beautifully worded, but if you eliminate some of these phrases and images, the remaining ones will be made even more precious.
Finally, welcome to yws and I hope you find a community you like. I hope to see more of you and your poetry around.