A breath of air travels your body,
Along the journey joins emotion.
The essence is felt by all who hear,
Your magical voice that lights the ocean.
The tender beauty that is your song,
Travels in dreams the extra mile.
When you speak your lovely tone,
You make the desert smile.
I love you like a thornless rose,
And to your voice I must listen.
For your tone is now my heartbeat,
You do not shine, you only glisten.
Thank you for your time,
Stevj016.
Your wonderful voice
this is very sweet ... did you have a particular voice in mind?
i'm thinking that there are ways this could be compressed and/or words that might be excluded to prevent telling the audience quite how wonderful this voice is ... but then it's a celebration of a particular by an equally particular so maybe that's of no matter ...
i'm thinking that there are ways this could be compressed and/or words that might be excluded to prevent telling the audience quite how wonderful this voice is ... but then it's a celebration of a particular by an equally particular so maybe that's of no matter ...
stevj016 wrote:A breath of air travels your body,
Along the journey joins emotion.
The essence is felt by all who hear,
Your magical voice that lights the ocean.
The tender beauty that is your song,
Travels in dreams the extra mile.
When you speak your lovely tone,
You make the desert smile.
I love you like a thornless rose,
And to your voice I must listen.
For your tone is now my heartbeat,
You do not shine, you only glisten.
Thank you for your time,
Stevj016.
Hmmm... try it in third person,Stev, repeats are boring ... you your, yahoo, ekkkk!
And correct your meter!
Nice attempt though. Keep at it
j
PS: Shelly, tis about time you showed, my love!
Hi,
Thank you all for your replies, I really appreciate it. Shell, yes this poem is about my girlfriends voice. Thanks for the advice Jasper, interesting idea about third person, will give it a go. What do you mean by correct my meter?
Thanks,
Stevj016.
Thank you all for your replies, I really appreciate it. Shell, yes this poem is about my girlfriends voice. Thanks for the advice Jasper, interesting idea about third person, will give it a go. What do you mean by correct my meter?
Thanks,
Stevj016.
With so strict a form, the meter could do with brushing up. Says me, who should take this advice myself. Perhaps dispensing with certain of the pronouns you use could help to even up the beat of the thing as a whole. Particularly in the final line of stanzas - the celebration:
"You do not shine, you glisten."
"You do not shine, you glisten."
Hi,
Thanks for the advice. How could I dispense the pronouns? What could I replace them with? In the first stanza all the lines have pretty much the same syllables, can improvements still be made on the flow/beat? In terms of the repetition of pronouns, yes I do agree, but how do I replace them and how do I improve the meter and flow?
In stanza two the syllables are a bit off, I will improve that. How about the third, aren't the syllables pretty much the same? I guess the main thing I need help with is the pronouns as I don't know how I could replace them? And I need help on how to improve the meter, because I'm a bit stuck as to how to improve that.
Thank you for your time,
Stevj016.
Thanks for the advice. How could I dispense the pronouns? What could I replace them with? In the first stanza all the lines have pretty much the same syllables, can improvements still be made on the flow/beat? In terms of the repetition of pronouns, yes I do agree, but how do I replace them and how do I improve the meter and flow?
In stanza two the syllables are a bit off, I will improve that. How about the third, aren't the syllables pretty much the same? I guess the main thing I need help with is the pronouns as I don't know how I could replace them? And I need help on how to improve the meter, because I'm a bit stuck as to how to improve that.
Thank you for your time,
Stevj016.
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BenJohnson
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Hi I've enjoyed reading your post. Personally I always enjoy a bit of rhyme. For years I used to syllable count all my lines when I wrote poems and couldn't work out why some lines didn't read as well as others. The reason is due to meter. When English is spoken certain words or syllables are stressed more strongly than others. By arranging the words so that the stresses fall at regular intervals you can create a beat that runs through the poem. Rather like the drum beat in a peice of music. This is meter.
The most often used meter is called iambic, it is an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one. This is most common because English speech falls fairly naturally into an iambic rhythm. The first line of your third stanza is a good example of this:
I love you like a thornless rose,
I have put the stressed syllables in bold for you. The idea is to try to write all the lines to follow the same pattern. There is a whole lot more to meter, but that is a start.
The most often used meter is called iambic, it is an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one. This is most common because English speech falls fairly naturally into an iambic rhythm. The first line of your third stanza is a good example of this:
I love you like a thornless rose,
I have put the stressed syllables in bold for you. The idea is to try to write all the lines to follow the same pattern. There is a whole lot more to meter, but that is a start.
Dear Stev,
Metrical poem is not my stuff. Ben has told you about the iambs. I feel recitation is important to know where the stresses lie. Though I myself didn't try it! Chuckles.
Nice write. Pretty cool images.
Metrical poem is not my stuff. Ben has told you about the iambs. I feel recitation is important to know where the stresses lie. Though I myself didn't try it! Chuckles.
Nice write. Pretty cool images.
Hi,
Thank you for your replies, I'm getting the hang of it now. I've attempted to highlight the stressed syllables in the poem, and theres a few changes that I thought might help the flow:
A breath of air roams your body,
Along the journey joins emotion.
The essence is felt by all who hear,
The wondrous voice that lights the ocean.
The tender beauty of your song,
Flies in dreams the extra mile.
When you speak the lovely tone,
It makes the desert smile.
I love you like a thornless rose,
And to the voice I must listen.
Your tone is now my heartbeat,
You do not shine, you glisten.
I know I've left out clearly obvious stressed syllables, mostly at the end of lines, but I didn't know which bits were stressed and there wouldn't have been any pattern. I've changed some of the pronouns, I don't know if doing that made it any better though. I did attempt to improve the meter but I don't know how I done, I don't know if how I've put the bolds are even close to being correct, for all I know the beat is far off a good rhythm. So how have I done? Have I improved it? And what could I do to even further improve the meter/beat of the poem?
Thank you for your time,
Stevj016.
Thank you for your replies, I'm getting the hang of it now. I've attempted to highlight the stressed syllables in the poem, and theres a few changes that I thought might help the flow:
A breath of air roams your body,
Along the journey joins emotion.
The essence is felt by all who hear,
The wondrous voice that lights the ocean.
The tender beauty of your song,
Flies in dreams the extra mile.
When you speak the lovely tone,
It makes the desert smile.
I love you like a thornless rose,
And to the voice I must listen.
Your tone is now my heartbeat,
You do not shine, you glisten.
I know I've left out clearly obvious stressed syllables, mostly at the end of lines, but I didn't know which bits were stressed and there wouldn't have been any pattern. I've changed some of the pronouns, I don't know if doing that made it any better though. I did attempt to improve the meter but I don't know how I done, I don't know if how I've put the bolds are even close to being correct, for all I know the beat is far off a good rhythm. So how have I done? Have I improved it? And what could I do to even further improve the meter/beat of the poem?
Thank you for your time,
Stevj016.
Hi there
A quick point to hopefully help you with meter. S2L1 and S3L1 are there, the rhythm balanced. S1L1 however sits apart, and not just because of the syllable count. Midline you have a much more languorous rhythm. See how (for example) "A breath of air that drifts through you" differs.
Feel free to ignore this though as I actually preferred it with the personal pronouns.
A quick point to hopefully help you with meter. S2L1 and S3L1 are there, the rhythm balanced. S1L1 however sits apart, and not just because of the syllable count. Midline you have a much more languorous rhythm. See how (for example) "A breath of air that drifts through you" differs.
Feel free to ignore this though as I actually preferred it with the personal pronouns.
just in terms of stresses this is where they fell when i read aloud ... was going to record it so you could hear but chickened out ... lol
A breath of air roams your body,
Along the journey joins emotion.
The essence is felt by all who hear, (i think "is" could go)
The wondrous voice that lights the ocean.
The tender beauty of your song,
Flies in dreams the extra mile.
When you speak the lovely tone,
It makes the desert smile.
I love you like a thornless rose,
And to the voice I must listen.
Your tone is now my heartbeat,
You do not shine, you glisten.
A breath of air roams your body,
Along the journey joins emotion.
The essence is felt by all who hear, (i think "is" could go)
The wondrous voice that lights the ocean.
The tender beauty of your song,
Flies in dreams the extra mile.
When you speak the lovely tone,
It makes the desert smile.
I love you like a thornless rose,
And to the voice I must listen.
Your tone is now my heartbeat,
You do not shine, you glisten.
A good reading from Shell, there, I think. Here, for you to compare and contrast, is mine ...
A breath of air travels your body,
Along the journey joins emotion.
The essence is felt by all who hear,
Your magical voice that lights the ocean.
The tender beauty that is your song,
Travels in dreams the extra mile.
When you speak your lovely tone,
You make the desert smile. (Only three beats here - okay?)
I love you like a thornless rose,
And to your voice I must listen. (Again, I'm only hearing three beats here.)
For your tone is now my heartbeat, (And again here.)
You do not shine, you only glisten.
Or something like that. It's very hard to get it right.
Cheers
David
A breath of air travels your body,
Along the journey joins emotion.
The essence is felt by all who hear,
Your magical voice that lights the ocean.
The tender beauty that is your song,
Travels in dreams the extra mile.
When you speak your lovely tone,
You make the desert smile. (Only three beats here - okay?)
I love you like a thornless rose,
And to your voice I must listen. (Again, I'm only hearing three beats here.)
For your tone is now my heartbeat, (And again here.)
You do not shine, you only glisten.
Or something like that. It's very hard to get it right.
Cheers
David
I did really like this it is very romantic.
However, I thought you could have come up with something a bit more original than " I love you like a thornless rose". To me its a bit of a cliche. Perhaps a metaphor would be better?
A very good start though€.
However, I thought you could have come up with something a bit more original than " I love you like a thornless rose". To me its a bit of a cliche. Perhaps a metaphor would be better?
A very good start though€.
"Poetry makes nothing happen. It survives in the valley of its saying." W.H. Auden
Hey. I enjoyed this poem a lot. I particularly liked the idea of someone's tone being set as another's heartbeat: it was vivid and made sense to me.
For me, you could maybe have cut a 'tone' (as you used the word twice) and, possibly, not used as many adjectives (e.g: magical, tender, lovely). The not shining, but glistening image also lost me a little.
There was a nice flow to this though. Thanks a lot.
Stephen
For me, you could maybe have cut a 'tone' (as you used the word twice) and, possibly, not used as many adjectives (e.g: magical, tender, lovely). The not shining, but glistening image also lost me a little.
There was a nice flow to this though. Thanks a lot.
Stephen