My Love

[ThePen]

This poem speaks of a fair lady, a woman that is my love.

Sweet fragrance, of perfume excelling,

Marvelous vision, of a form demanding.

Wavy hair, woven of a divine flair,

Alluring lady, of an elegance so fair.



Forms adorned with heavenly quality,

Beauty pleasing to the eye with regality.

Colors, shapes, sounds, a resounding bell,

Fountain of youth, springing a powerful well.



Silky hands made of a consoling touch,

Stout feet that stand in Peruvian rock.

O, delirious weakness, my Achilles' heel,

Heart of fire, thoughts that stand still.



Seductive eyes, pleasure without measure,

Olives devouring with a delectable azure.

Otherworldly dame graced in enduring fame,

Only sight enkindling the passionate flame.

[ellajam]

Hi, Pen, I've been having some difficulty with this. As an example, "Forms adorned with heavenly quality" There must be a more descriptive word for her form than "form" and a word for whatever heavenly quality you mean. I have no idea, the words you have chosen are just too general for me, this is a problem throughout much of the poem for me.

"Stout feet that stand in Peruvian rock." is a beautiful image.

All the white space slows this down in a way that I don't think is advantageous to the poem and the rhyme scheme seems off. Are you intending excelling and demanding to rhyme? And then the attempted rhymes seem to be abandoned in S3. It's an odd read.

I hope you continue to work on this, good luck with it.

This poem speaks of a fair lady, a woman that is my love.

Sweet fragrance, of perfume excelling,

Marvelous vision, of a form demanding.

Wavy hair, woven of a divine flair,

Alluring lady, of an elegance so fair.



Forms adorned with heavenly quality,

Beauty pleasing to the eye with regality.

Colors, shapes, sounds, a resounding bell,

Fountain of youth, springing a powerful well.



Silky hands made of a consoling touch,

Stout feet that stand in Peruvian rock.

O, delirious weakness, my Achilles' heel,

Heart of fire, thoughts that stand still.



Seductive eyes, pleasure without measure,

Olives devouring with a delectable azure.

Otherworldly dame graced in enduring fame,

Only sight enkindling the passionate flame.

[fluorescent.43]

This poem speaks of a fair lady, a woman that is my love.

Sweet fragrance, of perfume excelling,

Marvelous vision, of a form demanding.

Wavy hair, woven of a divine flair,

Alluring lady, of an elegance so fair.



Forms adorned with heavenly quality,

Beauty pleasing to the eye with regality.

Colors, shapes, sounds, a resounding bell,

Fountain of youth, springing a powerful well.



Silky hands made of a consoling touch,

Stout feet that stand in Peruvian rock.

O, delirious weakness, my Achilles' heel,

Heart of fire, thoughts that stand still.



Seductive eyes, pleasure without measure,

Olives devouring with a delectable azure.

Otherworldly dame graced in enduring fame,

Only sight enkindling the passionate flame.

eh... i read this poem over a few times-- i understand this is a love poem, but even for a poem it lacks depth. a lot of the lines seem to say the same thing-- she's beautiful. i'm not in love nor do i wrote poems like this because i'm simply not good enough to make it work, but i'd suggest adding things this woman does. things that make you (or the speaker, really) love this woman. small quirks. make her come alive within the poem instead of hiding what you really mean with pretty (a bit generic, as well) words. also, why are the lines spaced out like that? that's just an aesthetic nitpick; i'm sure you have your reasons. there are some really nice images in here, so i'd suggest picking a few and fleshing them out. also, the rhymes are kind of off. i suck at rhyming, but the rhyming switches on and off between stanzas.

i think this is a good premise, but worked over it could turn into something really nice. good luck with it!

[John]

Hi, Pen.

On first readings, I understand the depth of feeling of one for another in this work, but the way it has been expressed is a bit on the generic side, and doesn't do it justice. Easily rectified.

For example, what does the sweet fragrance actually do for the beholder? What does her form demand? Striking imagery will help you get rid of some adjectives, adverbs and gerunds. Wavy hair is meaningless in creating an image - too subjective - but using a simile may make her hair like the seaweed fronds of a mermaid's (don't quote me.)

I'll put a few general notes in the text and hope it helps.

My biggest issue is that the poem is neither formal in rhyme, rhythm, meter etc., or free verse because of erratic forced rhyme, and even couplets. If Joe Soap suddenly wanted to take an interest in poetry, what would he make of it?

Overall, you've got a work showing sentiments which could explode in the reader. And it's the reader that matters. We all want to be able to express our feelings in a manner seemingly the preserve of poets.

Go for it.

This poem speaks of a fair lady, a woman that is my love. This looks like the first line of the poem.

Sweet fragrance, of perfume excelling, Grammatical inversion. Don't know if it's legit, now.

Marvelous vision, of a form demanding. As above.

Wavy hair, woven of a divine flair,

Alluring lady, of an elegance so fair. Show me, don't tell me.



Forms adorned with heavenly quality, Again, heavenly is subjective and known to no-one. Perhaps notions of angelic?

Beauty pleasing to the eye with regality. Upright? Haughty? Condescending? A nose like Caesar? Or a beautiful tyrant?

Colors, shapes, sounds, a resounding bell,

Fountain of youth, springing a powerful well.



Silky hands made of a consoling touch,

Stout feet that stand in Peruvian rock.

O, delirious weakness, my Achilles' heel,

Heart of fire, thoughts that stand still.



Seductive eyes, pleasure without measure,

Olives devouring with a delectable azure.

Otherworldly dame graced in enduring fame,

Only sight enkindling the passionate flame.

[Mark A Becker]

Hello Pen-

Since this is in NOVICE, I'll try to go easy;

Nowhere in this poem do you show any inner attribute of "your lady". All of the observations are from a distance. This leads me to believe that "your lady" is not real person at all, but merely a construct of your imagination.

It seems that you are describing a statue. The adoration reads like puppy love, or a crush. Whether fictitious or not, "your lady" would become more human if there was any interaction.

Please bring real characteristics to "your lady" and try some interaction. A superficial treatment like this requires much more depth. I've known several knee-buckling, drop-dead, gorgeous woman in my life, and all of them (all of them) are 100% human on the inside. Many are disarmingly intelligent and wiity, to boot.

With this piece I sense a mild form of stalking, and ..... (this is where I need to stop)..

... Mark

[NobodyNothing]

Real thoughtful and good criticisms of this poem, methinks.  Take them to heart if you so desire.

[jams01752]

This poem speaks of a fair lady, a woman that is my love.

Sweet fragrance, of perfume excelling,

Marvelous vision, of a form demanding.

Wavy hair, woven of a divine flair,

Alluring lady, of an elegance so fair.



Forms adorned with heavenly quality,

Beauty pleasing to the eye with regality.

Colors, shapes, sounds, a resounding bell,

Fountain of youth, springing a powerful well.



Silky hands made of a consoling touch,

Stout feet that stand in Peruvian rock.

O, delirious weakness, my Achilles' heel,

Heart of fire, thoughts that stand still.



Seductive eyes, pleasure without measure,

Olives devouring with a delectable azure.

Otherworldly dame graced in enduring fame,

Only sight enkindling the passionate flame.

Hi,
Overall comment about the poem: although the theme which you have chosen is a broad theme (love) the imagery which is then used in the poem should not be as general as it is about something in particular with individual qualities. You are trying to describe 1.what these qualities are and 2.how they are perceived/why they are desirable/the emotion they evoke in you. A lot of the images seem non-specific and appear to me as Barnum statements (statements which apply to a large number of people). I think something to work on would be to make the imagery less vague and lower the range so it's more individual.
For example in lines 7+8
"Colors, shapes, sounds, a resounding bell,

Fountain of youth, springing a powerful well."

This is non-specific and leaves the poem open to ambiguity. What colours, shapes etc. Although sometimes ambiguity is necessary to convey multiple ideas at once I think with the purpose of this poem when describing something in particular more detailed descriptions/imagery is needed. Lastly, I enjoyed stanza three the most in this poem as I think it held the most powerful imagery.

James

[Brenkin]

Overall, this poem is quite ambiguous, though you seem to have a nice grasp on imagery. As others have said, some images here are quite well conveyed. However, some are too abstract, and leave in my opinion too much open to the reader. Overall though, the imagery is good.

However I feel like the rhyme feels a little forced, as well the theme of the poem feels a tad thin. Love poems are hard to keep topical and non-trite, but still your poem feels like something I've read before. Imagery is great, but a true provocative theme is what sparks attention and interest.

[joesammsington]

I am a bit confused by the olive part.. but otherwise the poem was very pleasant to read! Could you clarify?

[Tigonfre]

This poem speaks of a fair lady, a woman that is my love.

Sweet fragrance, of perfume excelling,

Marvelous vision, of a form demanding.

Wavy hair, woven of a divine flair,

Alluring lady, of an elegance so fair.



Forms adorned with heavenly quality,

Beauty pleasing to the eye with regality.

Colors, shapes, sounds, a resounding bell,

Fountain of youth, springing a powerful well.



Silky hands made of a consoling touch,

Stout feet that stand in Peruvian rock.

O, delirious weakness, my Achilles' heel,

Heart of fire, thoughts that stand still.



Seductive eyes, pleasure without measure,

Olives devouring with a delectable azure.

Otherworldly dame graced in enduring fame,

Only sight enkindling the passionate flame.

Without being Shakesperian this poem has a genuinely old English feel to it in my opinion, but in a good way. The words are elegant and gracious and you have used them in all the right places. The only negative aspect to the poem that I could mention is that the rhyme scheme does not serve a clear purpose, but otherwise it's a flawless poem.