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The Petals Creased
| Critical Analysis #2 |
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The Petals Creased |
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Streen Member
since 2001-11-28
Posts 169
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The crystal lilies met red dusk at day's end and all the petals creased, chilledpinched by silver-moon clouds.(which never thought they'd get so highso quick) The frosty stars set in, breathed whispery days coined and spent. Pollen seeped by crack, it froze white to purple, but ne'r touched ground, (where it would grow at dawn) a forgotten rose. The snowflakes settle sooner now, dusks redden softer than summer's peaches. Sometimes the petals crease too quick. |
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| © Copyright 2002 Derek Benz - All Rights Reserved | |||
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Severn Member Rara Avis
since 1999-07-17
Posts 7704 |
Overall - I really like this poem, Streen. The first word that comes to mind is refreshing. You've taken an almost ordinary topic (on the surface) and made it into something...original, different. In a literary world of cliche...that is a good thing, a very good thing. Stanza by stanza: The crystal lilies met red dusk at day's end and all the petals creased, chilledpinched by silver-moon clouds.(which never thought they'd get so highso quick) This is a poem of imagery, imagery forms the shell, but you don't want to run the risk of overburdening the shell so it cracks. In only a few places you run that risk here. Firstly: I've always had a thing about the word crystal - it's very overused. I actually think it sounds nice if you just have 'the lilies met red dusk' That's nice and clean, tight. 'Chilledpinched' is...brilliant? Joining two words in such a way can often be risky, but this is a success. Silver-moon cloud I also like. The fullstop/period after clouds doesn't work in context with the parenthesis though, and you need a space between the fs/p and the parenthesis. Is highso supposed to be one word? I'm undecided on that. When compared to chilledpinched..it's rather empty. Yet it does work quite well without such a comparison. The frosty stars set in, breathed whispery days coined and spent. Pollen seeped by crack, it froze white to purple, but ne'r touched ground, (where it would grow at dawn) a forgotten rose. Again, in the first line I'd remove the adjective 'frosty', and simply have 'the stars...' Primarily because only four lines down you use the word froze. The impression of chill has already come across quite strongly without the frosty. Breathed whispery days...oh, I like that line. I have a BIG problem with the 'n'er.' It's rather archaic, and doesn't seem to fit with the rest of the tone. Liking the rest of the stanza.. The snowflakes settle sooner now, dusks redden softer than summer's peaches. This had me stumbling. I've been reading over it trying to figure out why exactly. I like all the lines, I like the imagery - it's the way it flows that gets me. I'm thinking it could be the sibilance. Sibilance usually makes for a soft, gentle line...yet sometimes it can causes hiccups, simply because there is too much. Here's all the syllables: The snowflakes settle sooner now, dusks redden softer than summer's peaches. 11 out of 18 syllables are sibilant. You could reduce it by taking the plural away from summer's and have summer peaches instead. You could find another word for 'sooner' or 'softer' etc... Sometimes the petals crease too quick. Love these last two lines. A fitting ending I think. Well done, Streen..this was a pleasure to critique.  K[This message has been edited by Severn (09-18-2002 07:30 AM).] |
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Not A Poet Member Elite
since 1999-11-03
Posts 3885Oklahoma, USA |
Hi Streen, Good to see you back. I pretty much agree with Severn here. This is a nice refreshing poem. I also agree on crystal. It doesn't really add much anyway. I don't agree on chilledpinched though. To me it just screams TYPO. The same goes for highso. Definately replace ne'er with never. That's the only occurrence of anything archaic and using the full word does not detract at all. Thanks for the read, Pete |
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Radrook Senior Member
since 2002-08-09
Posts 648 |
First, I love descriptive poetry since it is akin to my avocation of producing digital art images. Here are my suggestions to make the poem work a little better. The crystal lilies met red dusk at day's end and all "At day's end" is redundant since "dusk" conveys the thought of day's end all by itself. So I would delete "at day's end" in order to tighten up the poem a bit." the petals creased, chilledpinched by silver-moon clouds.(which never thought they'd get so highso quick) [I would put the "creasing AFTER the pinching. If the creasing comes first, the pinching comes in as an afterthought. But since the pinching is the CAUSE of the creasing, it's logical location is temporal priority. I don't know why, but when I came to "chilledpinched" I thought of a certain Mexican food. Perhaps because as written, the "chille" part stands out too much. Then I noticed that it was all intended as one word without hyphenation. Having understood it that way, I ran right-smack-dab into "highso." This led me to conclude that you were writing in the tradition of E.E. Cummings. So I rejected the possibility of a typo. I got all fired up waiting for some more E.E. Cummingisms but was rather disappointed that there were no further ones to be found. This led to the suspicion of typos again. But this is all just me as you can see by the commentaries of all the fine critics who were totally impervious to all these things. Also, the personification of the clouds seems to promise their centrality within the theme.] The frosty stars set in, breathed whispery days coined and spent. Pollen seeped by crack, ["Pollen seeped into a crack?" "Pollen passed by a crack? I think "by" is too vague here.] it froze white to purple, but ne'r touched [The contraction "ne'r" is best avoided as a poeticism.] ground, (where it would grow at dawn) a forgotten rose. ["where it would have grown" better clarifies the concept]. The snowflakes settle sooner now, dusks redden softer than summer's peaches. Sometimes the petals crease too quick. [I would use the adverb "quickly" to modify the verb "crease." This avoids distracting readers in the minority who would notice such minor things.] I found the poem very interesting to read and very deserving of rereading it in search of a deeper meaning. That is one characteristic of good poetry, it is memorable and never tiresome. Thanks for sharing. BTW I liked the imagery of: The snowflakes settle sooner now, dusks redden softer than summer's peaches. I had no problems reading it at all. In fact, I was thoroughly engrossed by the imagery. Know what? I did not even notice the assonance! Quite to the contrary, it adds to the mysterious tone of the poem at dusk. That's because there is usually a soft wind at dusk due to the sudden change in temperature caused by the different angle that the sun's rays are coming through the atmosphere. Your use of the "s" sound blends right in with this windy part of the day! You didn't erase it--did you? [This message has been edited by Radrook (09-18-2002 05:08 PM).] |
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Not A Poet Member Elite
since 1999-11-03
Posts 3885Oklahoma, USA |
Oh yes, I forgot to say that I too rather liked all the s words in that one stanza. Pete |
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Streen Member
since 2001-11-28
Posts 169 |
Here is a revision after all the wonderful comments:  The lilies met red dusk at day's end and all the petals creased, chilledpinched by silver-moon clouds (which never thought they'd get so highso quick). The stars set in, breathed whispery days coined and spent. Pollen seeped by crack, it froze white to purple, but ,ne'r, touched ground, (where it would grow at dawn) a forgotten rose of an aged morn. The snowflakes settle sooner now, dusks redden softer than summer's peaches; and never is no more. Sometimes the petals crease too quick. ---------------- Thank you all for the many wonderful comments. I'm sorry I didn't reply sooner, things got hectic at school (senior year is a trouble, all that college application stuff) and then our phone lines went out for a day and a half, so that was yucky. Just to clarify things, yes, those were intended spellings. No typoes were made in the making of this poem, except for the period before the parentheses, thanks to Severn for catching that. I had just made an edit right before posting on here, and that had eluded me. And I have expanded upon the "ne'r" syndrome. It was not intended as many thought it to be. This is a poem not of summer, or the passing of seasons, but of the passing of life. I used ne'r because I identify myself as a poet, and it was a word used in the "morn" of poetry. But now, "never is no more." Hopefully, I cleared that up. Thanks to all you who said it was confusing, thus allowing me to drive my real point further. |
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Radrook Senior Member
since 2002-08-09
Posts 648 |
[Dusk is usually perceived as an end-of-day phenomenon. If it is dusk, it is usually undertood as end-of-day.] Merriam Websters Dictionary Main Entry: [3]dusk Function: noun Date: 1622 1 : the darker part of twilight especially at night 2 : darkness or semidarkness caused by the shutting out of light. [This message has been edited by Radrook (09-23-2002 01:53 PM).] |
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Streen Member
since 2001-11-28
Posts 169 |
Thank you for posting the definition of "dusk", but I was already well-aware of its meaning. But, you incorrectly stated that dusk is the end of the day necessarily. It isn't. It's the end of daylight. Today didn't start with dawn and end with dusk, it started with midnight and ended with midnight. While what I wrote appears to be redundant, it would be more redundant if I had written "at daylight's end." Still, I will consider how to change that line to make fuller known my intent. |
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Radrook Senior Member
since 2002-08-09
Posts 648 |
I stand corrected then. |
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