JUDGE MY POETRY

[Obsessed]

I have been asked to make a Petrarchan sonnet and a lyric poem and I'm really very very bad at poetry. I'm not confident on what I've made and I'm pretty sure I did MAJOR mistakes so I want someone to point it out before I give it over


Sonnet


???


Somewhere deep, dark, and cold, I cower


Somewhere deep, dark and cold, she follows


She whispers and laughs; her voice echoes


I hide and run, but I have no enough power


The words she throws are sweets and flowers


Yet they pierce you as painful as arrows


You've always been with me, high and low


But I wish you be sweep away like an ember


I wish to end this and be drowned in silence


But we're ribbons; we're each other’s bane


We're puppets; we speak what you speak


We're different but share the same appearance


I stare at my own reflection in pain


As I muffle my own cries and shrieks


Lyric poem


The sea (I love)??/???


Here I stand in the sea shore to watch the sun set


I see the sea and the sky together


Like how the stars appear every night to gather


I wish we could have the time be reset


So we could capture everything in a cassette


Before everything flies like a feather


I close my eyes and feel the wind in my face


It reminds me of your soft caress


That always makes my heart race


The warmth of the sea reminds me of your embrace


That always makes me feel safe


I open my eyes to see the sun gone


Just like when you said we were done


The sting of the sea reminds me of my heartache


When I am awake


And know you are gone


I'm cureently in 9th grade. If you were my English teacher, how would you grade these out of 10? 10 being the highest and 1 the lowest.

 

[Dusky]

I'm not sure about the lyric poem, but the sonnet would receive a low grade. There are supposed to be ten syllables a line and I'm counting eleven, and the stress should be on every other syllable but I'm not seeing any consistent meter.


It may behoove you to google some examples. c:

 

[Obsessed]

I'm not sure about the lyric poem, but the sonnet would receive a low grade. There are supposed to be ten syllables a line and I'm counting eleven, and the stress should be on every other syllable but I'm not seeing any consistent meter.
It may behoove you to google some examples. c:

Oh? I forgot to put, I was told to make a Petrarchan sonnet, not a Shakesperean. I didn't read it was supposed to have 10 syllables but 5 pairs of iambic (and a couple of analests, etc). And what's wrong with my lyric poem? It's not so music-ky(?) right?


Thanks for commenting by the way, I really appreciate it.

 

[Dusky]

Well any given sonnet might have a couple rare differences, but an iamb is one unstressed syllable followed by one stressed syllable. 2 syllables in an iamb times five iambs per line equals ten syllables per line, every other one being stressed.


I don't know much about lyric poems, so I'm no help there.


EDIT: To clarify, when talking about having iambs, it doesn't mean you can write an iamb then write a few words then write another iamb. The whole thing needs to be in iambic pentameter, there shouldn't be anything except iambs.


EDIT 2: Anapests and other meter components are generally only to be used in a sonnet when A) you just can't for your life figure out how to make it work otherwise OR B) (if you are an actual poet who genuinely cares about this kind of thing) to send a message about what you are saying by breaking rhythm symbolically.

 

[Obsessed]

Well any given sonnet might have a couple rare differences, but an iamb is one unstressed syllable followed by one stressed syllable. 2 syllables in an iamb times five iambs per line equals ten syllables per line, every other one being stressed.
I don't know much about lyric poems, so I'm no help there.


EDIT: To clarify, when talking about having iambs, it doesn't mean you can write an iamb then write a few words then write another iamb. The whole thing needs to be in iambic pentameter, there shouldn't be anything except iambs.

Ah okay, thank you very much!

 

[Dusky]

Ah okay, thank you very much!

Any time! Looks like you caught the post before I finished my second edit. I kept thinking of things to say.


I love poetry, so feel free to hit me up whenever about this kind of thing.

 

[Obsessed]

Any time! Looks like you caught the post before I finished my second edit. I kept thinking of things to say.
I love poetry, so feel free to hit me up whenever about this kind of thing.

I read the 2nd edit. And so, I made another one that fits the 10 syllable criteria (i think) but I don't know if it follows the 5 unstressed and stressed pattern though....


In the deepest and darkest I cower


And so She who cannot leave and follows,


Whose voice is loud and endlessly echoes,


Which torments me, I who has no power.


Her words fragrant as sweets and flowers


Yet they pierce you as painful as arrows.


You taunt me endlessly, I who is low,


Who wish you to be blown like an ember,


And I free from the tyranny and shame.


But we are tied; we are each other’s bane;


We do what you do; we speak what you speak;


We are different but we are the same;


And so I stare at my own self in pain,


As I muffle my own heart’s cries and shrieks.

 

[Dusky]

The stress is still a bit wonky, but it's a definite improvement!


A lot of people have trouble with stress. I co-wrote a poetry guide that's kicking around RPN, actually - lemme pull a quote or two from it.

We’ll stick with English poetry here and talk about some of the better-known, arguably simpler stuff. Like iambic pentameter~. Which doesn’t sound simple - but once you figure out what it means, it’s a breeze. There are also a great many ways to change it up… but let’s not confuse you too much just yet.
Look at you - finishing my sentences. Anyway, the iamb is a pairing of syllables - one unstressed, followed by a stressed. A stressed syllable is one on which emphasis is placed. (See what I did there?) The pentameter part means there are five of these to a line. Short/long syllables can also work.


Example- Ooh! Ooh! I got this!

St. Judas - James Wright


When I went out to kill myself, I caught


A pack of hoodlums beating up a man.


Running to spare his suffering, I forgot


My name, my number, how my day began,


How soldiers milled around the garden stone


And sang amusing songs; how all that day


Their javelins measured crowds; how I alone


Bargained the proper coins, and slipped away.


Banished from heaven, I found this victim beaten,


Stripped, kneed, and left to cry. Dropping my rope


Aside, I ran, ignored the uniforms:


Then I remembered bread my flesh had eaten,


The kiss that ate my flesh. Flayed without hope,


I held the man for nothing in my arms.

Good call, Dusky. Take a moment to read a few lines of that out loud, see if you can catch the da-DUM-da-DUM kinda rhythm the iambs produce. Good rule of thumb - start with the words with multiple syllables. Hoodlums. Where’s the stress there? Saying that aloud provides a backdrop for the rest of the line, since stress on monosyllabic words often varies by context. A lot of people have trouble with recognizing stress - really the only thing I can recommend for that is practice, practice, practice.


Y’all call me DUSS-kee. Say that aloud. Now say duss-KEE. Weird, right? That’s because the stress goes on the dus part.


By the by, this is also an example of a sonnet - but of a more modern variety we won't be covering here.

There’s a wiki page on meter - you should consider checking it out, folks; it’s a good way to figure out where to start learning more, if nothing else. It has a number of metrical systems to offer and you might find one you like the look of.

SonnetThere are two kinds of sonnet, in English - the Petrarchan (originally Italian) and the Shakespearean. Both are iambic pentameter’s stomping grounds.

The Vision - Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch)


Translated by Edmund Spenser


‘Being one day at my window all alone,


So manie strange things happened me to see,


As much as it grieveth me to thinke thereon.


At my right hand a hynde appear’d to mee,


So faire as mote the greatest god delite;


Two eager dogs did her pursue in chace.


Of which the one was blacke, the other white:


With deadly force so in their cruell race


They pincht the haunches of that gentle beast,


That at the last, and in short time, I spide,


Under a rocke, where she alas, opprest,


Fell to the ground, and there untimely dide.


Cruell death vanquishing so noble beautie


Oft makes me wayle so hard a desire.’

The Petrarchan is 14 lines long, divided into an octet (8 lines) and a sestet (7 lines), with a rhyme in the octet of abbaabba - more easily done in Italian, really - and the sestet is more flexible. Originally used for love poetry, the octet normally sets up a situation and the sestet addresses it. It’s been suggested to me Petrarch was veiling gnosticism in metaphor, and while compelling… well, consider the historical context of this form to be love poetry, and let that inform how you use it. To the left is an example from the man himself.

[/justify]

 

[Obsessed]

The stress is still a bit wonky, but it's a definite improvement!
A lot of people have trouble with stress. I co-wrote a poetry guide that's kicking around RPN, actually - lemme pull a quote or two from it.

I knew it! Thanks for the quote! And on these past few days, I've been talking to myself and reciting words to get the stress and unstressed but I don't seem to get it... do you have any tips so I can get the words' stress right?

 

[Dusky]

Well, you could always look up where the stress is on certain words and start memorizing, then saying it out loud so you know what to look for.


i.e. The stress in Obsessed goes on -sessed. So say obsessed like you normally would.


That same "ess" sound is the unstressed syllable in the word "recess," i.e. what kids have at school when they get a break to play outside.


Obsessed


Recess.


So what is the difference between the "ess" sounds in those two words? That's where the difference between stress and lack thereof is.