It has been a little while since I indulged in the analysis, rather than the composition or contemplation, of sonnets in this space. This ends now! Let's take a look at another old sonnet of mine, and see if we can't say something helpful about it.
I'm not allowed to say how beautiful
You looked tonight. I think I might go mad.
I looked at other women, but a pull
From your appearance took from what they had
All my appreciation. Look, I tried,
I really did, to look away from you
But I just couldn't. My own eyes defied
My every order - though I must admit they knew
What I desired better than my mind.
I know I shouldn't say it, but desire
Makes me incapable of being blind
And I must tell you. I could say a fire
Burns within me, but that's poetry:
Let's just say you look beautiful to me.
What Went Wrong:
There is one very awkward phrase here: "a pull/from your appearance took from what they had/All my appreciation" not only doesn't roll off the tongue smoothly, but is quiet convoluted when you look at it outside the context of the sonnet too. The ending feels a bit pat; I've noticed, and I expect anyone who has been reading either these old sonnet analyses or the new sonnets being posted here has also noticed, that I have a tendency to that sort of, well, not quite oversimplification, not quite sappiness, but perhaps (over)tidiness. The poem has so much enjambment that the neat unrolling of that last line seems perhaps trite, and certainly in tension with the rhythms that have come before it. The trope of refusing poetry in the middle of a poem is also overused, which contributes to that sense.
Not Too Shabby:
I like the rhythms here. There's a lot of enjambment followed by a half-line that creates an end-stop, and vice-versa, where a half-line leads into a one-and-a-half. That start/stop rhythm seems to reinforce the message of the poem, while also leading towards a certain degree of ambiguity about the sense, if not the sincerity, of the narrator. I really like a couple of the figures, particularly "desire/makes me incapable of being blind," which I find to be a neat aversion of the blinded by desire trope, and the first two lines. The visual emphases - even the "look" as an emphatic - also seem to be handled fairly well, without becoming overly belabored. And, despite what I said above, there is something redeeming about the last line and its setup: it refuses to go any further towards poetry than the initial desire at the top of the poem. In a sense, this poem is a spiral - a circle with progression - because it begins and ends with the desire to express how beautiful the love object is - in one case expressed through the refusal to express it, in the other directly stated. Rather than vowing eternal love, etherealizing the love object, or even elevating the diction of the statement, the final line simply achieves the desire posited at the start: "let's just say you look beautiful to me."
Showing posts with label old sonnets. Show all posts
Showing posts with label old sonnets. Show all posts
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Friday, December 17, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets XIII
So this time we will look at a poem consciously, and intentionally, written to try to fit an older model. Obviously this involves archaism; but unlike some others we have looked at, this poem is not simply throwing archaism into an otherwise modern poem, but actually attempting to map onto those older expectations.
Ah, Muse, if thou wilt not stay for my sake
Nor listen to the reasons of my own,
And if hard-hearted towards me thou hast grown,
I charge thee yield thyself to my heartache.
Remain with me to sing my love awake
That she may see the seeds that she has sown.
Do not, O Muse, desert me all alone
And leave me that my heart may ever break.
Thy aid, pray lend to join me in this song;
Not spoke out loud, yet may its verses ring;
When that she reads, O, help her eyes along
That she may hear the love I have to bring,
And though around her other suitors throng,
Let her but hear my loving voice to sing.
What Went Wrong:
In modern terms, an invocation to the Muse makes no sense. It's just weird. But we'll pass that by for the moment, and look at the poem on its own terms: "listen to the reasons of my own" is faulty grammar, by which I mean that it doesn't actually make sense. The poem seems unwilling to decide whether it is a song or something to be read; it almost seems to alternate in the sestet, which can induce intellectual whiplash. Even for an archaic-styled poem, there are some harsh breaks - "not spoke out loud" and "leave me that my heart may ever break" are both perilously close to, if not over, the edge of too much syntactical telescoping, while "when that she reads" turns towards the other extreme.
Not Too Shabby:
Taking the invocation of the Muse as legitimate, it's actually not badly done. The Muse is invoked for a specific purpose, which animates the entire poem. The rhymes are strong, and the octave/sestet division clear. The (unrhymed) couplets in the sestet are, I think, effective, and other than the issue of read/sing confusion, they build effectively. I really like "I charge thee yield thyself to my heartache" as a surprise rhyme for "sake" and as a central line of the entire poem thematically.
Archaism:
This is a poem clearly written to be archaic. It does a good job of picking up the thee and thou correctly, rather than just sticking "-eth" on everything, but there are higher standards than that. The invocation of the Muse, the initial "ah," and the "thou" in the first line are all clear signals, front-loaded in the poem, of what this poem is trying to accomplish chronologically as well as artistically. This is substantially better than throwing archaisms in to make the poem work later after a start that implies a more modern sensibility. The fact that these elements remain used throughout helps as well. I would hardly call this a model of how to do archaism, but certainly it manages to leap the basic hurdles one should avoid tripping over if using archaism as an intentional effect: it does not misuse the constructions, it is formed around a conceit that is appropriate to the style, it continues the effect throughout, and it reads like a coherent whole once the conceit is accepted.
Ah, Muse, if thou wilt not stay for my sake
Nor listen to the reasons of my own,
And if hard-hearted towards me thou hast grown,
I charge thee yield thyself to my heartache.
Remain with me to sing my love awake
That she may see the seeds that she has sown.
Do not, O Muse, desert me all alone
And leave me that my heart may ever break.
Thy aid, pray lend to join me in this song;
Not spoke out loud, yet may its verses ring;
When that she reads, O, help her eyes along
That she may hear the love I have to bring,
And though around her other suitors throng,
Let her but hear my loving voice to sing.
What Went Wrong:
In modern terms, an invocation to the Muse makes no sense. It's just weird. But we'll pass that by for the moment, and look at the poem on its own terms: "listen to the reasons of my own" is faulty grammar, by which I mean that it doesn't actually make sense. The poem seems unwilling to decide whether it is a song or something to be read; it almost seems to alternate in the sestet, which can induce intellectual whiplash. Even for an archaic-styled poem, there are some harsh breaks - "not spoke out loud" and "leave me that my heart may ever break" are both perilously close to, if not over, the edge of too much syntactical telescoping, while "when that she reads" turns towards the other extreme.
Not Too Shabby:
Taking the invocation of the Muse as legitimate, it's actually not badly done. The Muse is invoked for a specific purpose, which animates the entire poem. The rhymes are strong, and the octave/sestet division clear. The (unrhymed) couplets in the sestet are, I think, effective, and other than the issue of read/sing confusion, they build effectively. I really like "I charge thee yield thyself to my heartache" as a surprise rhyme for "sake" and as a central line of the entire poem thematically.
Archaism:
This is a poem clearly written to be archaic. It does a good job of picking up the thee and thou correctly, rather than just sticking "-eth" on everything, but there are higher standards than that. The invocation of the Muse, the initial "ah," and the "thou" in the first line are all clear signals, front-loaded in the poem, of what this poem is trying to accomplish chronologically as well as artistically. This is substantially better than throwing archaisms in to make the poem work later after a start that implies a more modern sensibility. The fact that these elements remain used throughout helps as well. I would hardly call this a model of how to do archaism, but certainly it manages to leap the basic hurdles one should avoid tripping over if using archaism as an intentional effect: it does not misuse the constructions, it is formed around a conceit that is appropriate to the style, it continues the effect throughout, and it reads like a coherent whole once the conceit is accepted.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets XII
I realized that I have not analyzed a sonnet that I had real issues with in a while. So it is time to do so! It's always more interesting, as a matter of craft, I think, when I can take one apart.
I wondered if I wandered by a star
Or built my house upon a fire-mount
The light was growing, greater now by far
'Til it had passed capacity to count
Or measure. All the senses were aglow
As if the eyes had vanquished all the rest
And, as the victors in the senses' row
Had all the other put under arrest,
That all of them did see the growing light.
So far surpassed this sweet event my eye
That I, bebaffled, did renounce my sight
Believing it must sure have told a lie
But true it was, now poor I must admit
For dark is here now you my vision quit.
What Went Wrong:
The horrible, horrible pseudoarchaism. "Fire-mount"? "'Til it had passed capacity to count" (a verb that would make no sense in that context anyway)? "That all of them did see"? "So far surpassed this sweet event my eye"? "true it was"? "poor I must admit"? "now you my vision quit"? And for the love of God, fun as it is to say, "bebaffled"?
Let this serve as an object lesson: if it sounds wrong, don't write it. Just because you, or in this case obviously, I, have some absurd idea about what might have sounded right several centuries ago, that doesn't mean you should inflict that vision on a poor defenseless sonnet. There are better ways to say it. Yes, in some slight pathetic measure of defense it might be said that all those terribly twisted inversions of syntactic order allow the important words to hit the stressed syllables, but that's hardly an excuse. It's best to look at a line with meter, rhythm (of the sentence as distinct from meter), and syntax in mind, and, if you decide there is no good way to say what you want to say and rhyme without violating at least one of the three, pick the way that violates the fewest (preferably none or one). In this case, I clearly chose to violate both rhythm of the line and syntax to preserve meter, which is a poor choice. The saddest part is that the answer to "where did you do that?" isn't a single line; it is, in a sense, the whole poem.
Besides that, of course, the archaism also shows up in the diction, with invented words. Bebaffled is at least fun to say, if a little pointless given that it clearly simply tacked on a syllable to baffled. Fire-mount is silly, and not in a good way. It sounds tacky, archaic, and yet unlikely to have actually been archaically attested. In short, it has everything negative about archaism and none of the positive.
Besides all of that, if this were a better poem I would comment on issues like the confusion that the syntactical mish-mosh introduces at the end of the poem. I would also note that "row" is a false rhyme, since that use of the word should really be "rauw" rather than "roe," but has to be "roe" to rhyme with "aglow." But there's just so much more to comment on...
Not Too Shabby:
So is there anything that can be salvaged? I like "I wondered if I wandered" for the use of those two echoing words together. If it were not surrounded by all the other archaisms and silliness, "bebaffled" would actually be a fun coinage. And for some reason "all the senses were aglow" appeals to me as an image, especially the implication that other senses than sight were involved. It should be "all my senses," but it still sounds good. Sadly, that's about all that wasn't too shabby for words.
I wondered if I wandered by a star
Or built my house upon a fire-mount
The light was growing, greater now by far
'Til it had passed capacity to count
Or measure. All the senses were aglow
As if the eyes had vanquished all the rest
And, as the victors in the senses' row
Had all the other put under arrest,
That all of them did see the growing light.
So far surpassed this sweet event my eye
That I, bebaffled, did renounce my sight
Believing it must sure have told a lie
But true it was, now poor I must admit
For dark is here now you my vision quit.
What Went Wrong:
The horrible, horrible pseudoarchaism. "Fire-mount"? "'Til it had passed capacity to count" (a verb that would make no sense in that context anyway)? "That all of them did see"? "So far surpassed this sweet event my eye"? "true it was"? "poor I must admit"? "now you my vision quit"? And for the love of God, fun as it is to say, "bebaffled"?
Let this serve as an object lesson: if it sounds wrong, don't write it. Just because you, or in this case obviously, I, have some absurd idea about what might have sounded right several centuries ago, that doesn't mean you should inflict that vision on a poor defenseless sonnet. There are better ways to say it. Yes, in some slight pathetic measure of defense it might be said that all those terribly twisted inversions of syntactic order allow the important words to hit the stressed syllables, but that's hardly an excuse. It's best to look at a line with meter, rhythm (of the sentence as distinct from meter), and syntax in mind, and, if you decide there is no good way to say what you want to say and rhyme without violating at least one of the three, pick the way that violates the fewest (preferably none or one). In this case, I clearly chose to violate both rhythm of the line and syntax to preserve meter, which is a poor choice. The saddest part is that the answer to "where did you do that?" isn't a single line; it is, in a sense, the whole poem.
Besides that, of course, the archaism also shows up in the diction, with invented words. Bebaffled is at least fun to say, if a little pointless given that it clearly simply tacked on a syllable to baffled. Fire-mount is silly, and not in a good way. It sounds tacky, archaic, and yet unlikely to have actually been archaically attested. In short, it has everything negative about archaism and none of the positive.
Besides all of that, if this were a better poem I would comment on issues like the confusion that the syntactical mish-mosh introduces at the end of the poem. I would also note that "row" is a false rhyme, since that use of the word should really be "rauw" rather than "roe," but has to be "roe" to rhyme with "aglow." But there's just so much more to comment on...
Not Too Shabby:
So is there anything that can be salvaged? I like "I wondered if I wandered" for the use of those two echoing words together. If it were not surrounded by all the other archaisms and silliness, "bebaffled" would actually be a fun coinage. And for some reason "all the senses were aglow" appeals to me as an image, especially the implication that other senses than sight were involved. It should be "all my senses," but it still sounds good. Sadly, that's about all that wasn't too shabby for words.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets XI
It isn't every day that I look through my poems and discover one I like and yet don't ever remember writing. That was, however, what happened this day, so here, without further ado, is the sonnet in question:
I look at you and I remember when
I wrote you poems; and you read them too.
They said what everyone already knew
But you were happy hearing it again.
I think I knew what I was doing then;
I wrote because I was in love with you.
I can't imagine what else I should do.
Sometimes I wish I were like other men
And not impulsive in the way I've been;
But then I think of what I used to write
And how it made you feel, and how we were.
It's times like that, I think, when I prefer
To be myself. I hope we can begin
To heal those wounds and make us both all right.
What Went Wrong:
I'm not a huge fan of rhyming homophones, much less having one such rhyme end a sonnet; but I did it here. I am not sure how "I can't imagine what else I should do" fits into the poem, other than as a vehicle for the rhyme. It would probably be better expressed as something like "And didn't know what else I ought to do," because that would avoid the following pitfalls it currently falls into: standing unattached to previous or following lines, having major stresses (particularly "should") fall on unstressed syllables (and the penultimate is a bad syllable to stress), and falling into the present tense when it should properly be in the past. The last problem is especially pointed because it is clear that in the present the narrator can imagine what else he should do, in that he has apparently stopped writing the poems. Putting the sentence into the past (with something like "didn't know") would solve this difficulty.
Not Too Shabby:
This is a poem that does not really reach for rhymes. The exceptions are above, but the awkwardness of the standalone line at seven has little to do with reaching for a rhyme and more to do with poor construction (I think the suggestion above would fix it) and the homophones are present precisely because the poem refuses to reach for any different rhyme than the one the sense presented, which happened to be homophonic. There is a difference between reaching for a rhyme (and thus twisting the sense, syntax, or both of the line) and picking a non-ideal rhyme that fits into the line, and this is the latter. I also like the flow of this poem. The initial quatrain hits one beat, the next three lines are another, then the next two, then the next five are all really one beat, although it could be divided into two and three. The rhythms of the ever-smaller groups followed by the larger, almost too-large, group seems to reflect, in my mind at least, how thought can follow small paths into ever smaller detail and then suddenly shoot up into a broader point, much as the poem does. Or if that's too highfalutin for you, which I think it might be for me, I find the flow attractive because it bridges the octave/sestet structure, allows enjambment between lines with different rhymes but does not break individual lines, and gives the poem a strong sense of narrative. Finally, I like the diction: the words are simple, they express meaning very straightforwardly, and they sound like someone might actually say them in the order presented. Yet the poem manages not to sound simplistic, because the rhythm, flow, and rhyme are all so strong.
I look at you and I remember when
I wrote you poems; and you read them too.
They said what everyone already knew
But you were happy hearing it again.
I think I knew what I was doing then;
I wrote because I was in love with you.
I can't imagine what else I should do.
Sometimes I wish I were like other men
And not impulsive in the way I've been;
But then I think of what I used to write
And how it made you feel, and how we were.
It's times like that, I think, when I prefer
To be myself. I hope we can begin
To heal those wounds and make us both all right.
What Went Wrong:
I'm not a huge fan of rhyming homophones, much less having one such rhyme end a sonnet; but I did it here. I am not sure how "I can't imagine what else I should do" fits into the poem, other than as a vehicle for the rhyme. It would probably be better expressed as something like "And didn't know what else I ought to do," because that would avoid the following pitfalls it currently falls into: standing unattached to previous or following lines, having major stresses (particularly "should") fall on unstressed syllables (and the penultimate is a bad syllable to stress), and falling into the present tense when it should properly be in the past. The last problem is especially pointed because it is clear that in the present the narrator can imagine what else he should do, in that he has apparently stopped writing the poems. Putting the sentence into the past (with something like "didn't know") would solve this difficulty.
Not Too Shabby:
This is a poem that does not really reach for rhymes. The exceptions are above, but the awkwardness of the standalone line at seven has little to do with reaching for a rhyme and more to do with poor construction (I think the suggestion above would fix it) and the homophones are present precisely because the poem refuses to reach for any different rhyme than the one the sense presented, which happened to be homophonic. There is a difference between reaching for a rhyme (and thus twisting the sense, syntax, or both of the line) and picking a non-ideal rhyme that fits into the line, and this is the latter. I also like the flow of this poem. The initial quatrain hits one beat, the next three lines are another, then the next two, then the next five are all really one beat, although it could be divided into two and three. The rhythms of the ever-smaller groups followed by the larger, almost too-large, group seems to reflect, in my mind at least, how thought can follow small paths into ever smaller detail and then suddenly shoot up into a broader point, much as the poem does. Or if that's too highfalutin for you, which I think it might be for me, I find the flow attractive because it bridges the octave/sestet structure, allows enjambment between lines with different rhymes but does not break individual lines, and gives the poem a strong sense of narrative. Finally, I like the diction: the words are simple, they express meaning very straightforwardly, and they sound like someone might actually say them in the order presented. Yet the poem manages not to sound simplistic, because the rhythm, flow, and rhyme are all so strong.
Monday, December 6, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets X
It's been a while since I analyzed a sonnet here; and longer since it was my own poetry I exposed to my glare. So I thought it might be nice to pull a random sonnet out of my sonnet sequence and give it the treatment. So here we go:
The night I met him, I was going to tell
You everything, and ask you on a date.
But something in me prompted me to wait
Although I strained against it. I could smell
That something wasn't right, and so to hell
With all of that. I wish that I could hate
One of you two, or destiny, or fate
For doing this to me, but no. O well,
Life is what it will be. I'll wonder though
While smiling and making conversation
What might have been, if on some other night
Not stopped by that incisive realization
I'd asked you, and you'd told me yes or no
But I guess it's better this way - right?
What Went Wrong:
Cards on the table: I kinda like this sonnet. But it's definitely not perfect. There are a couple lines that fall afoul of what I'd like to be a convention but isn't actually: they're all monosyllables, or all but one, which I really prefer not to see in iambic pentameter (this includes the first line, but particularly "With all of that. I wish that I could hate"). There are also a couple of lines with really awkward moves towards the rhyme; I'm thinking particularly of "For doing this to me, but no. Oh well," which seems to have realized midway through the line that there needed to be a rhyme at the end of it and just finished up the sentence ASAP and gone running on to the rhyme. Indeed, the entire insertion of "Oh well/Life is what it will be" feels strained, like a bridge that can't quite justify why the two parts it connects are connected. I could also point out the clear disconnect between the end, with its suggestion of the need for a yes/no answer, and the rest of the poem, with its implication that a no answer has in fact been received in some sense, even if not explicitly by words.
Not Too Shabby:
The rhyme scheme here, despite the reach described above, works well; the octave/sestet division is strong (and partly justifies the "oh well," as part of the turn) and the ebb and flow within the octave is also strong, with the rhymed pairs date/wait, smell/hell, and hate/fate encapsulating somewhat the modulations that section undergoes. I like matching the feminine lines ending in "conversation" and "realization," and along with that I like the interwoven (rather than simply cookie-cutter) rhymes of the sestet. My basic impression of this poem as a whole is that it is one of the (few) sonnets I have written in an Petrarchan mode that really takes advantage of the octave/sestet division and the ability to move on from a problem established in the octave and expand and clarify it in the sestet. The enjambment between the two sections works well for that. Combining that effect with the sudden turn at the end of the poem, with the monosyllabic question "right?", feels, well, right, and does a good job of expressing the uncertainty and indecisiveness in which the poem wallows. As a final thought on form, I also like the endstopping of the second line, as it clearly expresses the issue being explored, and allows the remainder of the poem to work itself out in two paired and enjambed sestets, yet another expansion of the possibilities of the basic octave/sestet design.
The night I met him, I was going to tell
You everything, and ask you on a date.
But something in me prompted me to wait
Although I strained against it. I could smell
That something wasn't right, and so to hell
With all of that. I wish that I could hate
One of you two, or destiny, or fate
For doing this to me, but no. O well,
Life is what it will be. I'll wonder though
While smiling and making conversation
What might have been, if on some other night
Not stopped by that incisive realization
I'd asked you, and you'd told me yes or no
But I guess it's better this way - right?
What Went Wrong:
Cards on the table: I kinda like this sonnet. But it's definitely not perfect. There are a couple lines that fall afoul of what I'd like to be a convention but isn't actually: they're all monosyllables, or all but one, which I really prefer not to see in iambic pentameter (this includes the first line, but particularly "With all of that. I wish that I could hate"). There are also a couple of lines with really awkward moves towards the rhyme; I'm thinking particularly of "For doing this to me, but no. Oh well," which seems to have realized midway through the line that there needed to be a rhyme at the end of it and just finished up the sentence ASAP and gone running on to the rhyme. Indeed, the entire insertion of "Oh well/Life is what it will be" feels strained, like a bridge that can't quite justify why the two parts it connects are connected. I could also point out the clear disconnect between the end, with its suggestion of the need for a yes/no answer, and the rest of the poem, with its implication that a no answer has in fact been received in some sense, even if not explicitly by words.
Not Too Shabby:
The rhyme scheme here, despite the reach described above, works well; the octave/sestet division is strong (and partly justifies the "oh well," as part of the turn) and the ebb and flow within the octave is also strong, with the rhymed pairs date/wait, smell/hell, and hate/fate encapsulating somewhat the modulations that section undergoes. I like matching the feminine lines ending in "conversation" and "realization," and along with that I like the interwoven (rather than simply cookie-cutter) rhymes of the sestet. My basic impression of this poem as a whole is that it is one of the (few) sonnets I have written in an Petrarchan mode that really takes advantage of the octave/sestet division and the ability to move on from a problem established in the octave and expand and clarify it in the sestet. The enjambment between the two sections works well for that. Combining that effect with the sudden turn at the end of the poem, with the monosyllabic question "right?", feels, well, right, and does a good job of expressing the uncertainty and indecisiveness in which the poem wallows. As a final thought on form, I also like the endstopping of the second line, as it clearly expresses the issue being explored, and allows the remainder of the poem to work itself out in two paired and enjambed sestets, yet another expansion of the possibilities of the basic octave/sestet design.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets IX
This is a sonnet I go back and forth on, regarding how good I think it is; and therefore I thought it would be a good topic for an analysis. When I originally wrote it, the gender of the subject kept switching back and forth, although I think it has now settled on a "he." For now; who knows what tomorrow might bring. But here it is in any case:
He'll never leave her. You should realize that
Before it hurts you. Don't be stupid, let
Me advise you. Watch from where I sat
And see his head rest on her shoulder. Yet
That's not the worst - his hand is on her knee
And hers on his. He's resting in her love
Because he is secure in it. You see?
I know they may not be the model of
A perfect couple, but they're happy, and
They will not split apart. Accept it. You
Might be important to him, but you stand
Between them, and that simply will not do.
He'll say goodbye someday - and you will grieve.
Prevent that now - I'm telling you, just leave.
What Went Wrong:
So one of the reasons I sometimes think I don't like this sonnet is the way it constantly runs into itself and sticks emphases in odd places. The lonely "Yet" and the lonely "let" in lines four and two respectively feel weak; the same might be said of the "you" ending line ten or the "and" ending line nine; even the internal emphases can feel off, as in line nine as a whole. It feels almost like a prose monologue slightly shifted in order to make it fit the sonnet form. The enjambment is probably too heavy, and the internal pauses ("Accept it" in the middle of a line, the dashes and the interjections) are overmarked. Yet for something that sounds like a prose monologue, the sentences are awfully poor: "Watch from where I sat/and see his head rest on her shoulder," "He's resting in her love/Because he is secure in it," and "I know they may not be the model of/A perfect couple, but they're happy, and/They will not split apart" all seem extremely stilted when written out. The bad side of this poem is that it gets caught up in the urgency and desperation of the emotion it is trying to convey and ends up tripping heavily over the formal aspects of the sonnet.
Not Too Shabby:
The flip side of that perspective is that the emotion is strong; the enjambment in particular shows the urgency - almost no line is willing to let the reader pause. The couplet is strong, although perhaps the dashes should be a comma in the one case and a period in the second. The short, punctuated feeling of many of the sentences reinforces the urgency shown by the enjambment and sets up that final couplet for maximum force; as does the enjambment which gives way to two of the few end-stopped lines in lines twelve and thirteen (line seven is end-stopped, but only with the two-word phrase "You see?" rather than as the end of a larger buildup). The incessant repetition of the third person pronouns at the start seems effective to me, as it draws "her" and "his" (and their other forms obviously) closer and closer through rhetoric alone even as the narrative draws them closer as well; it gives way to a "they"/"you" contrast in the second half of the poem, which seems equally effective, and the separation of the "he" and "you" in line thirteen is made the more poignant by those patterns. Finally, the rhymes seem almost accidental at times, at least to me, which I find to be powerful; this effect is bolstered by the enjambment which place the rhyme words not at the (obviously premeditated) ends of sentences, but in the chaotic middle where they seem more effortless. This is the counterbalance to the occasional stretch for a rhyme: even the stretches look like they occurred as the result of muddled thinking by the narrator rather than a reach by the author because of the hurried internal reality of the poem.
He'll never leave her. You should realize that
Before it hurts you. Don't be stupid, let
Me advise you. Watch from where I sat
And see his head rest on her shoulder. Yet
That's not the worst - his hand is on her knee
And hers on his. He's resting in her love
Because he is secure in it. You see?
I know they may not be the model of
A perfect couple, but they're happy, and
They will not split apart. Accept it. You
Might be important to him, but you stand
Between them, and that simply will not do.
He'll say goodbye someday - and you will grieve.
Prevent that now - I'm telling you, just leave.
What Went Wrong:
So one of the reasons I sometimes think I don't like this sonnet is the way it constantly runs into itself and sticks emphases in odd places. The lonely "Yet" and the lonely "let" in lines four and two respectively feel weak; the same might be said of the "you" ending line ten or the "and" ending line nine; even the internal emphases can feel off, as in line nine as a whole. It feels almost like a prose monologue slightly shifted in order to make it fit the sonnet form. The enjambment is probably too heavy, and the internal pauses ("Accept it" in the middle of a line, the dashes and the interjections) are overmarked. Yet for something that sounds like a prose monologue, the sentences are awfully poor: "Watch from where I sat/and see his head rest on her shoulder," "He's resting in her love/Because he is secure in it," and "I know they may not be the model of/A perfect couple, but they're happy, and/They will not split apart" all seem extremely stilted when written out. The bad side of this poem is that it gets caught up in the urgency and desperation of the emotion it is trying to convey and ends up tripping heavily over the formal aspects of the sonnet.
Not Too Shabby:
The flip side of that perspective is that the emotion is strong; the enjambment in particular shows the urgency - almost no line is willing to let the reader pause. The couplet is strong, although perhaps the dashes should be a comma in the one case and a period in the second. The short, punctuated feeling of many of the sentences reinforces the urgency shown by the enjambment and sets up that final couplet for maximum force; as does the enjambment which gives way to two of the few end-stopped lines in lines twelve and thirteen (line seven is end-stopped, but only with the two-word phrase "You see?" rather than as the end of a larger buildup). The incessant repetition of the third person pronouns at the start seems effective to me, as it draws "her" and "his" (and their other forms obviously) closer and closer through rhetoric alone even as the narrative draws them closer as well; it gives way to a "they"/"you" contrast in the second half of the poem, which seems equally effective, and the separation of the "he" and "you" in line thirteen is made the more poignant by those patterns. Finally, the rhymes seem almost accidental at times, at least to me, which I find to be powerful; this effect is bolstered by the enjambment which place the rhyme words not at the (obviously premeditated) ends of sentences, but in the chaotic middle where they seem more effortless. This is the counterbalance to the occasional stretch for a rhyme: even the stretches look like they occurred as the result of muddled thinking by the narrator rather than a reach by the author because of the hurried internal reality of the poem.
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets VIII
Because I have a lengthy back list of sonnets, I think it's time to move through them a little more quickly than I have been. Particularly, since I'm trying to move randomly through various periods of my previous work, rather than simply chronologically, I think it's valuable to put sonnets from different periods up close to each other. So without further ado:
Sometimes you want a friend, sometimes you don't;
I never quite know what you need from me.
Sometimes you'll open up, sometimes you won't;
I try to help you, be there patiently,
But also let you have your space. I know
Enough about you that I want to be
Your friend, however you want me to show
That friendship. I admit I cannot see
The future, and I don't know if someday
We will lose touch; or if you, finally
Will realize you don't need me and say
You'd rather we were friendly distantly.
But I'll say this; as this year nears its end
I'm very glad that you have been my friend.
What Went Wrong:
I am not quite sure where to put this observation, so I'll front it: this poem has a lot of enjambment (that itself is not a problem). But it specifically has a couple lines that fall into a trap I often fall into, which I cannot decide whether I like or not, which is that I tend to make either the first or last foot completely distinct from the other four. So there are lines like "But also let you have your space. I know" or "Your friend, however you want me to show," with strong breaks after the first or before the last foot. I'm not really sure how effective that style is; on the one hand it represents strong enjambment, which can be a very positive thing because it ties lines closely together, but on the other hand it breaks the fundamental unit of the line at an awkward place, and when they are run together it can look like the entire poem is simply two syllables off from where it naturally wants to be (which of course could be a desired effect, but honestly usually isn't in my sonnets). I'm also unsure here about the mirror between the first and third lines; it gets the (cheap) don't/won't rhyme and hammers it home, the lines are good meter, and the sentiment is crucial to the poem, but it feels like a cop-out. The couplet also feels a little flat; I don't think most of the syllables in this poem are wasted, but those that are are in phrases like "this year nears its end/I'm very glad that you have been my friend." Finally, the reuse of the -ee rhyme (me/patiently, be/see, and finally/distantly) seems a little sloppy; although its appearance in every quatrain does do some good work tying the poem's first twelve lines together.
Not Too Shabby:
Overall I think this poem fits the label directly above pretty spot on: not my best poem, but not too shabby. As noted above, before the couplet I'm actually very happy with the syllable usage, as not much seems wasted. It could almost read like prose, except that it happens to hit the meter and rhyme very well as well, and the line breaks are, I think effective. I really like the wording "you'd rather we were friendly distantly," and whatever may be said about the wording of the couplet (as above), the slight turn it effects is one I really both enjoy and think works in the context of the poem. I'm also happy with the caesuras, which fall irregularly within the line but are fairly strong, an effect I don't usually manage to create, but one which here I think emphasizes the way the narrator is describing being pulled in two directions at once. Other than the couplet, I have very few actual problems with this sonnet, and it manages to convey exactly what it wants to (or at least I think it does), so I would call it, as above, not too shabby on the whole.
Sometimes you want a friend, sometimes you don't;
I never quite know what you need from me.
Sometimes you'll open up, sometimes you won't;
I try to help you, be there patiently,
But also let you have your space. I know
Enough about you that I want to be
Your friend, however you want me to show
That friendship. I admit I cannot see
The future, and I don't know if someday
We will lose touch; or if you, finally
Will realize you don't need me and say
You'd rather we were friendly distantly.
But I'll say this; as this year nears its end
I'm very glad that you have been my friend.
What Went Wrong:
I am not quite sure where to put this observation, so I'll front it: this poem has a lot of enjambment (that itself is not a problem). But it specifically has a couple lines that fall into a trap I often fall into, which I cannot decide whether I like or not, which is that I tend to make either the first or last foot completely distinct from the other four. So there are lines like "But also let you have your space. I know" or "Your friend, however you want me to show," with strong breaks after the first or before the last foot. I'm not really sure how effective that style is; on the one hand it represents strong enjambment, which can be a very positive thing because it ties lines closely together, but on the other hand it breaks the fundamental unit of the line at an awkward place, and when they are run together it can look like the entire poem is simply two syllables off from where it naturally wants to be (which of course could be a desired effect, but honestly usually isn't in my sonnets). I'm also unsure here about the mirror between the first and third lines; it gets the (cheap) don't/won't rhyme and hammers it home, the lines are good meter, and the sentiment is crucial to the poem, but it feels like a cop-out. The couplet also feels a little flat; I don't think most of the syllables in this poem are wasted, but those that are are in phrases like "this year nears its end/I'm very glad that you have been my friend." Finally, the reuse of the -ee rhyme (me/patiently, be/see, and finally/distantly) seems a little sloppy; although its appearance in every quatrain does do some good work tying the poem's first twelve lines together.
Not Too Shabby:
Overall I think this poem fits the label directly above pretty spot on: not my best poem, but not too shabby. As noted above, before the couplet I'm actually very happy with the syllable usage, as not much seems wasted. It could almost read like prose, except that it happens to hit the meter and rhyme very well as well, and the line breaks are, I think effective. I really like the wording "you'd rather we were friendly distantly," and whatever may be said about the wording of the couplet (as above), the slight turn it effects is one I really both enjoy and think works in the context of the poem. I'm also happy with the caesuras, which fall irregularly within the line but are fairly strong, an effect I don't usually manage to create, but one which here I think emphasizes the way the narrator is describing being pulled in two directions at once. Other than the couplet, I have very few actual problems with this sonnet, and it manages to convey exactly what it wants to (or at least I think it does), so I would call it, as above, not too shabby on the whole.
Saturday, November 6, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets VII
Today we will consider a sonnet with some qualities that I consider strange - and one of the few that can simultaneously swing me back to the immediate moment when it was written and make me laugh, without being written about anything particularly humorous in and of itself (unless you are one of those who find the emotions portrayed in this poem amusing; I have been there as well). Without further ado, the sonnet:
Electric shocks that ripple through my soul
Down to my stomach, which I almost lose
And paint the floor, and cover my nice shoes
With dinner, and my former sushi roll,
And maybe breakfast too. Was that your goal?
Or did it do the same to you, that wooz
Y feeling in the nether bits? You cruise
On by me with no backward glance. The whole
Of me is shaking. Yet I breathe, relax
And think it doesn't matter. And I'm right.
I'm done with you, I've played it to the max
So I am done with wilting in your sight.
I'm ready now, until you pass again
We'll see if I am really ready then.
What Went Wrong:
The first sentence, um, isn't grammatical. It would be without the "that," or with another verb to make an independent clause after the dependent clause. But as it is, the sonnet starts with a dependent clause all on its own. Which is not allowed. There is no reason for the shoes particularly to be "nice," other than that a syllable was required there; "nether bits" is particularly awkwardly phrased (although an argument could be made that it is intentionally awkward, and/or an attempt to conjure up both the aforementioned stomach and the other nether bits at the same time); "played it to the max" has both a technically undefined antecedent for "it" and a feeling of being there solely to rhyme "relax;" for some reason, "with dinner, and my former sushi roll" seems like a weak line - I think it's the fact that it could basically be elided, plus the oddness of the specificity included in the "former sushi roll." All these are problems, and I think together they work in common to make the poem - and indirectly, the speaker - seem a little out of sorts, which is not inappropriate to the subject of the poem, but does seem overdone; one should not be able to claim that all errors in a poem are simply to make it seem awkward. That's weak sauce as criticism and as writing.
Not Too Shabby:
However, the overall effect of discomfort is, I think, effective. Why? Because it's carried out throughout the poem, not just in what seem like the weak points. The rhymes (the scheme is ABBAABBACDCDEE) are just unexpected enough to conjure up that same discomfort, but other than the slight stretch for "to the max," they are solid; lose/shoes/wooz-/cruise and soul/roll/goal/whole do very nicely at avoiding both predictability and repetition while keeping the rhymes going, and wooz/y is particularly apt, given the discomfort of the whole poem, the meaning of woozy, and the helter-skelter effect of running the word over two lines. That is an effect I do not suggest using frequently, but I feel like it works here; one might almost say that the first line vomits the end of the word onto the second, which is perfectly in line with the emotion being presented. I really like the turn in this poem as well, or rather the two turns, one at "Yet I breathe," and the other in the couplet. Between them they keep the poem a little on edge, and they avoid predictability, even while leading to a slightly predictable end point, which is a neat juggling act. I also like a lot of the word choice in this poem, not just in the rhyme words but throughout; and I like the variation in sentence and clause lengths, from the long first sentence to the short staccato of "Was that your goal?" and "And I'm right." Overall, I feel this poem teeters on the verge of not working, but rescues itself from that brink repeatedly, reenacting the narrator's own struggle in a way that ultimately presents an excellent encapsulation of the emotions of the moment being portrayed.
Electric shocks that ripple through my soul
Down to my stomach, which I almost lose
And paint the floor, and cover my nice shoes
With dinner, and my former sushi roll,
And maybe breakfast too. Was that your goal?
Or did it do the same to you, that wooz
Y feeling in the nether bits? You cruise
On by me with no backward glance. The whole
Of me is shaking. Yet I breathe, relax
And think it doesn't matter. And I'm right.
I'm done with you, I've played it to the max
So I am done with wilting in your sight.
I'm ready now, until you pass again
We'll see if I am really ready then.
What Went Wrong:
The first sentence, um, isn't grammatical. It would be without the "that," or with another verb to make an independent clause after the dependent clause. But as it is, the sonnet starts with a dependent clause all on its own. Which is not allowed. There is no reason for the shoes particularly to be "nice," other than that a syllable was required there; "nether bits" is particularly awkwardly phrased (although an argument could be made that it is intentionally awkward, and/or an attempt to conjure up both the aforementioned stomach and the other nether bits at the same time); "played it to the max" has both a technically undefined antecedent for "it" and a feeling of being there solely to rhyme "relax;" for some reason, "with dinner, and my former sushi roll" seems like a weak line - I think it's the fact that it could basically be elided, plus the oddness of the specificity included in the "former sushi roll." All these are problems, and I think together they work in common to make the poem - and indirectly, the speaker - seem a little out of sorts, which is not inappropriate to the subject of the poem, but does seem overdone; one should not be able to claim that all errors in a poem are simply to make it seem awkward. That's weak sauce as criticism and as writing.
Not Too Shabby:
However, the overall effect of discomfort is, I think, effective. Why? Because it's carried out throughout the poem, not just in what seem like the weak points. The rhymes (the scheme is ABBAABBACDCDEE) are just unexpected enough to conjure up that same discomfort, but other than the slight stretch for "to the max," they are solid; lose/shoes/wooz-/cruise and soul/roll/goal/whole do very nicely at avoiding both predictability and repetition while keeping the rhymes going, and wooz/y is particularly apt, given the discomfort of the whole poem, the meaning of woozy, and the helter-skelter effect of running the word over two lines. That is an effect I do not suggest using frequently, but I feel like it works here; one might almost say that the first line vomits the end of the word onto the second, which is perfectly in line with the emotion being presented. I really like the turn in this poem as well, or rather the two turns, one at "Yet I breathe," and the other in the couplet. Between them they keep the poem a little on edge, and they avoid predictability, even while leading to a slightly predictable end point, which is a neat juggling act. I also like a lot of the word choice in this poem, not just in the rhyme words but throughout; and I like the variation in sentence and clause lengths, from the long first sentence to the short staccato of "Was that your goal?" and "And I'm right." Overall, I feel this poem teeters on the verge of not working, but rescues itself from that brink repeatedly, reenacting the narrator's own struggle in a way that ultimately presents an excellent encapsulation of the emotions of the moment being portrayed.
Friday, October 15, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets VI
I no longer remember when I wrote this sonnet; I do know that for some reason the first line resonates with me, and pops up into my memory at strange times and in strange places.
Monochromatic as I used to be
Portrayed in only grayish scale and hue
I seek the color of eternity
Unending swathes of purple, red, and blue.
A deep cerulean to coat my sea
The evening sky a bronze museum piece
And shadows of the deepest shade of plum
Unsettling the steady light grey hum
That fills my world and never seems to cease
Except to modulate and mock at me.
These vibrant and demanding colors rise
Where black and white have stood this endless while
They burst from out your smile and your eyes
And spring like flowers in your brilliant smile.
What Went Wrong:
I think we can all look at the final two lines here and say in unison what went most wrong: I used smile twice. That was silly of me, and it robs the ending of substantial punch. I think it might be better rewritten as (well, almost anything, but try this on for size) "They burst out of the sweetness in your eyes/And spring like flowers from your brilliant smile," which has the additional virtue of correcting a couple other minor errors, specifically the prepositions. It's better to burst out of than from out and better by far to have flowers springing from the smile than in the smile, unless the subject of the poem has been eating the topiary. I'm also not a huge fan of "grayish scale and hue," because it means "gray hue" but is stretched out over more than twice as many syllables for no real reason besides meter. The "steady light gray hum" isn't nearly as bad an offender, but in the context of having already had a "grayish scale and hue" it suddenly looks suspicious. Also, is the world black and white or gray? It seems that it's probably grayscale, but the sudden introduction of the starker terms in line twelve seems out of place. And if the colors "never cease/except to modulate," are they ceasing or aren't they? It seems a bit confused, and not in a particularly fruitful way.
Not Too Shabby:
The idea of the poem is spot on. The rhyme scheme is innovative (ABABACDDCAEFEF) and I think does a nice job of bringing out the unusual nature of the colors being mentioned in the middle sestet. It also contrasts nicely the first and last quatrains with their opposition of the narrator's monochromatic life and the "demanding" colors the subject is introducing into that life. Some of the lines are quite good, notably the first, third (which is a little hyperbolic, but works well to introduce the specific colors that follow), the eleventh, and the fourteenth. I'm also quite happy that "purple, red, and blue" are then mirrored in "cerulean," "bronze," and "plum," albeit in the opposite order, which works well as conservation of color lends a sense of sincerity. I love the idea of the colors "demanding." And I simply cannot get over that first line: fitting "monochromatic" into iambic pentameter makes me ecstatic for some reason.
Monochromatic as I used to be
Portrayed in only grayish scale and hue
I seek the color of eternity
Unending swathes of purple, red, and blue.
A deep cerulean to coat my sea
The evening sky a bronze museum piece
And shadows of the deepest shade of plum
Unsettling the steady light grey hum
That fills my world and never seems to cease
Except to modulate and mock at me.
These vibrant and demanding colors rise
Where black and white have stood this endless while
They burst from out your smile and your eyes
And spring like flowers in your brilliant smile.
What Went Wrong:
I think we can all look at the final two lines here and say in unison what went most wrong: I used smile twice. That was silly of me, and it robs the ending of substantial punch. I think it might be better rewritten as (well, almost anything, but try this on for size) "They burst out of the sweetness in your eyes/And spring like flowers from your brilliant smile," which has the additional virtue of correcting a couple other minor errors, specifically the prepositions. It's better to burst out of than from out and better by far to have flowers springing from the smile than in the smile, unless the subject of the poem has been eating the topiary. I'm also not a huge fan of "grayish scale and hue," because it means "gray hue" but is stretched out over more than twice as many syllables for no real reason besides meter. The "steady light gray hum" isn't nearly as bad an offender, but in the context of having already had a "grayish scale and hue" it suddenly looks suspicious. Also, is the world black and white or gray? It seems that it's probably grayscale, but the sudden introduction of the starker terms in line twelve seems out of place. And if the colors "never cease/except to modulate," are they ceasing or aren't they? It seems a bit confused, and not in a particularly fruitful way.
Not Too Shabby:
The idea of the poem is spot on. The rhyme scheme is innovative (ABABACDDCAEFEF) and I think does a nice job of bringing out the unusual nature of the colors being mentioned in the middle sestet. It also contrasts nicely the first and last quatrains with their opposition of the narrator's monochromatic life and the "demanding" colors the subject is introducing into that life. Some of the lines are quite good, notably the first, third (which is a little hyperbolic, but works well to introduce the specific colors that follow), the eleventh, and the fourteenth. I'm also quite happy that "purple, red, and blue" are then mirrored in "cerulean," "bronze," and "plum," albeit in the opposite order, which works well as conservation of color lends a sense of sincerity. I love the idea of the colors "demanding." And I simply cannot get over that first line: fitting "monochromatic" into iambic pentameter makes me ecstatic for some reason.
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets V
It's time for another trip in the wayback machine, this time with added profanity! This comes from one of the several protracted periods when I was struggling more than usual with how to express emotions simultaneously in modern words and sonnet verse (for evidence that I am always struggling with this issue, see here). This particular case involved attempting to use profanity and simpler sentence structures, as we will examine afterwards in the usual commentary.
Why the fuck am I in love with you?
It would be so much better if I weren't.
I wouldn't envy everything you do
With someone else. I might, in time, have learnt
To be a friend, a good one, and not be
Always desiring more. I love your smile,
But I could do that and not love you, see
You laughing and not feel that all the while
My heart was being torn. It would be nice
To be with you, and not to be in love.
And yet not loving you would be the price,
And that is something I'm protective of -
I love to love you; and that's why I do.
If only you reciprocated too.
What Went Wrong:
This sonnet starts off with a bang. There's "fuck," right in the middle of the first line. Is that a good idea? I'm still unsure. It definitely gets the point of the poem out there immediately, but it's also, I think, a sign of weakness. It says "I have to do this now for you to keep reading," and it says "I couldn't come up with a better way to say this." Now, it's arguable that, since the line is actually quite decent metrically speaking, there doesn't have to be a better way to say it. But certainly there is a measure of desperation there not only on the part of the poem's narrator, which is fine, but of the poet, which is bad. This is the blunt instrument way of incorporating "modern diction" into the poem: short words, and profanity, smacking you in the face really hard as soon as you start reading. Otherwise, there are a couple places where the interaction of the meter and word order seems unfortunate: "always desiring more" almost seems like an afterthought to complete the above rhyme, and "something I'm protective of" doesn't quite feel natural either. The word "love" gets repeated an awful lot; not necessarily enough for it to start losing all meaning, but fairly close. It's interesting to wonder how it relates to the "desiring" in line five or the being "protective" in line twelve, both of which deviate from the dominance of the singular verb love.
Not Too Shabby:
The English rhyme scheme I think fits the blunt Anglo-Saxon theme of this poem. Really only "protective" and "reciprocated" are not simple, everyday words, and they aren't exactly uncommon or out of place. "Learnt" instead of "learned" might go in that category too, although it's really easy to understand and, I personally think, actually a pretty good way to slip out of the rhyme trap of "weren't" while allowing the former, naturally contracted form to appear where it ought to. The poem does a fairly good job of examining the indecision inside its narrator's mind between the advantages of not-loving and the advantage (and apparent necessity) of loving. The balance between lines one and thirteen("Why the fuck am I in love with you" and "I love to love you; and that's why I do") in both sense and rhyme (and repeating the initial rhyme in the couplet is very effective here) not only brings a good sense of closure, or at least completeness, to the poem, but also punches up the effect of the final line, which is tied in with respect to sense and rhyme and yet also manages to stick out because lines one through thirteen have summed themselves up so well. That sticking-out effect in turn emphasizes that final line and gives the sense that it sums up the entire rest of the poem - which of course it does. On a smaller note, I like how the compliments about how pleasant the love object is are buried inside the complaining tone of the poem as a whole.
Diction:
As mentioned, obviously this poem is an attempt to go into more natural or everyday speech rhythms and diction while retaining the sonnet form. I'm not entirely sure how successful it is; metrically it seems to work, although that may be partly because monosyllables are easier to group into iambs than polysyllabic words, and it certainly provides the poem with a punch that can sometimes be lacking, but as I mentioned above there is a sense of a blunt instrument about the means in which it is achieved. Too many monosyllables can weaken a line by undermining its rhythms (after all, a full word receives in a sense full stress, unlike the unaccented syllables of longer words) and too strong of a commitment to avoid longer words can be as stilted as too strong a commitment to include them. I think that overall this is a successful effort, but the weak half-lines mentioned in the first section of analysis in lines six and twelve look like aftereffects of too many monosyllables, which in turn often increase the sheer number of words and push meaning into those enjambed overflow sections. The fact remains, though, that the meter and rhymes both manage to escape largely unharmed by the intended change in rhythm and diction, and the directness of the poem is certainly improved, which seems to me to signal a successful experiment within the terms in which it was created.
Why the fuck am I in love with you?
It would be so much better if I weren't.
I wouldn't envy everything you do
With someone else. I might, in time, have learnt
To be a friend, a good one, and not be
Always desiring more. I love your smile,
But I could do that and not love you, see
You laughing and not feel that all the while
My heart was being torn. It would be nice
To be with you, and not to be in love.
And yet not loving you would be the price,
And that is something I'm protective of -
I love to love you; and that's why I do.
If only you reciprocated too.
What Went Wrong:
This sonnet starts off with a bang. There's "fuck," right in the middle of the first line. Is that a good idea? I'm still unsure. It definitely gets the point of the poem out there immediately, but it's also, I think, a sign of weakness. It says "I have to do this now for you to keep reading," and it says "I couldn't come up with a better way to say this." Now, it's arguable that, since the line is actually quite decent metrically speaking, there doesn't have to be a better way to say it. But certainly there is a measure of desperation there not only on the part of the poem's narrator, which is fine, but of the poet, which is bad. This is the blunt instrument way of incorporating "modern diction" into the poem: short words, and profanity, smacking you in the face really hard as soon as you start reading. Otherwise, there are a couple places where the interaction of the meter and word order seems unfortunate: "always desiring more" almost seems like an afterthought to complete the above rhyme, and "something I'm protective of" doesn't quite feel natural either. The word "love" gets repeated an awful lot; not necessarily enough for it to start losing all meaning, but fairly close. It's interesting to wonder how it relates to the "desiring" in line five or the being "protective" in line twelve, both of which deviate from the dominance of the singular verb love.
Not Too Shabby:
The English rhyme scheme I think fits the blunt Anglo-Saxon theme of this poem. Really only "protective" and "reciprocated" are not simple, everyday words, and they aren't exactly uncommon or out of place. "Learnt" instead of "learned" might go in that category too, although it's really easy to understand and, I personally think, actually a pretty good way to slip out of the rhyme trap of "weren't" while allowing the former, naturally contracted form to appear where it ought to. The poem does a fairly good job of examining the indecision inside its narrator's mind between the advantages of not-loving and the advantage (and apparent necessity) of loving. The balance between lines one and thirteen("Why the fuck am I in love with you" and "I love to love you; and that's why I do") in both sense and rhyme (and repeating the initial rhyme in the couplet is very effective here) not only brings a good sense of closure, or at least completeness, to the poem, but also punches up the effect of the final line, which is tied in with respect to sense and rhyme and yet also manages to stick out because lines one through thirteen have summed themselves up so well. That sticking-out effect in turn emphasizes that final line and gives the sense that it sums up the entire rest of the poem - which of course it does. On a smaller note, I like how the compliments about how pleasant the love object is are buried inside the complaining tone of the poem as a whole.
Diction:
As mentioned, obviously this poem is an attempt to go into more natural or everyday speech rhythms and diction while retaining the sonnet form. I'm not entirely sure how successful it is; metrically it seems to work, although that may be partly because monosyllables are easier to group into iambs than polysyllabic words, and it certainly provides the poem with a punch that can sometimes be lacking, but as I mentioned above there is a sense of a blunt instrument about the means in which it is achieved. Too many monosyllables can weaken a line by undermining its rhythms (after all, a full word receives in a sense full stress, unlike the unaccented syllables of longer words) and too strong of a commitment to avoid longer words can be as stilted as too strong a commitment to include them. I think that overall this is a successful effort, but the weak half-lines mentioned in the first section of analysis in lines six and twelve look like aftereffects of too many monosyllables, which in turn often increase the sheer number of words and push meaning into those enjambed overflow sections. The fact remains, though, that the meter and rhymes both manage to escape largely unharmed by the intended change in rhythm and diction, and the directness of the poem is certainly improved, which seems to me to signal a successful experiment within the terms in which it was created.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets IV
I apologize for the delays in posting; certain scheduling difficulties arose, which I do not anticipate arising again anytime soon. Let's just jump right back into the swing of things with another analysis; while this blog will often consist predominantly of new work, if only because it can be hard to shift gears when in what feels like a creative state, the call of analysis is ever-present, and should not be ignored. So let's go ahead and look at one of my old sonnets, so that I can be appropriately nasty to it.
My face is just a mirror of desire
But mirrors are not windows. Look at me
As closely as you like, and you will see
Nothing but what is in you. I acquire
The outside form of what you would inspire
But do not show my own. Stare carefully
And you might notice something silvery
Behind the glass. Of course, if you inquire
You might see what's behind that - but unless
You ask directly, do not think you'll find
The secret to my future happiness
Or what I want right now so clearly lined
In how I look. If asked, I may confess,
But otherwise my face won't show my mind.
What Went Wrong:
So the first thing that's a little awkward about this sonnet is the rhythm. We must assume that the "-ire" ending is bisyllabic (ac-qui-re) rather than monosyllabic (ac-quire), but that's an acceptable option, I think; more troublesome are things like "what I want right now so clearly lined," with both "right now" and "so clearly" looking much more like placeholders for the verse than necessary modifiers. Obviously they do contribute to the poem, mostly by accentuating its insistence on the individuality of this precise moment (maybe later, not now) and the ambiguity of the emotions being expressed (not clearly visible, reflective, unrepresentative). So they aren't a complete loss. But they're definitely weak, and their placement in the last line of the last quatrain, a powerful position, somewhat undercuts the strength of the poem. The silveriness of what is inside the narrator is also never explained, and looks awfully like a reach for a rhyme. There is a possibility of a quicksilver/mercurial temperament that might be implied by the adjective (and obviously, mirrors are silvered) so there is, again, some justification for it, but it is also weak. And some of the emphases in the lines, especially "You might see what's behind that, but unless," seem to fall a bit off of the meter, although again that might be salvageable by pointing out that the poem is all about expectation, the seeming satisfaction of that expectation, and the implication that the satisfaction is false - something is just a little bit off, just as in the verse.
Not Too Shabby:
Besides the exculpatory points offered above in defense of weakness, there are some more definitely positive things about this poem. The Italian form, I believe, contributes to the flow of the poem and to its meaning; by using a more strict rhyme scheme, the issue of expectation and seeing only what you look for is heightened, and the rhymes, with the possible exception of "silvery," fit well into both the meaning and the meter. The poem as a whole is a good unpacking of the first sentence (lines 1-2) and an explanation, yet there still manages to be a turn at line 9 just as there should be. The theme is an interesting one too. Sadly, I think this poem comes out as a little less than the sum of its parts; the exculpatory points end up not covering the weaknesses as much as they might, and so the poem is unsatisfactory on the whole, despite good technique. But the technique is there, as a building block for either editing or future poetry.
My face is just a mirror of desire
But mirrors are not windows. Look at me
As closely as you like, and you will see
Nothing but what is in you. I acquire
The outside form of what you would inspire
But do not show my own. Stare carefully
And you might notice something silvery
Behind the glass. Of course, if you inquire
You might see what's behind that - but unless
You ask directly, do not think you'll find
The secret to my future happiness
Or what I want right now so clearly lined
In how I look. If asked, I may confess,
But otherwise my face won't show my mind.
What Went Wrong:
So the first thing that's a little awkward about this sonnet is the rhythm. We must assume that the "-ire" ending is bisyllabic (ac-qui-re) rather than monosyllabic (ac-quire), but that's an acceptable option, I think; more troublesome are things like "what I want right now so clearly lined," with both "right now" and "so clearly" looking much more like placeholders for the verse than necessary modifiers. Obviously they do contribute to the poem, mostly by accentuating its insistence on the individuality of this precise moment (maybe later, not now) and the ambiguity of the emotions being expressed (not clearly visible, reflective, unrepresentative). So they aren't a complete loss. But they're definitely weak, and their placement in the last line of the last quatrain, a powerful position, somewhat undercuts the strength of the poem. The silveriness of what is inside the narrator is also never explained, and looks awfully like a reach for a rhyme. There is a possibility of a quicksilver/mercurial temperament that might be implied by the adjective (and obviously, mirrors are silvered) so there is, again, some justification for it, but it is also weak. And some of the emphases in the lines, especially "You might see what's behind that, but unless," seem to fall a bit off of the meter, although again that might be salvageable by pointing out that the poem is all about expectation, the seeming satisfaction of that expectation, and the implication that the satisfaction is false - something is just a little bit off, just as in the verse.
Not Too Shabby:
Besides the exculpatory points offered above in defense of weakness, there are some more definitely positive things about this poem. The Italian form, I believe, contributes to the flow of the poem and to its meaning; by using a more strict rhyme scheme, the issue of expectation and seeing only what you look for is heightened, and the rhymes, with the possible exception of "silvery," fit well into both the meaning and the meter. The poem as a whole is a good unpacking of the first sentence (lines 1-2) and an explanation, yet there still manages to be a turn at line 9 just as there should be. The theme is an interesting one too. Sadly, I think this poem comes out as a little less than the sum of its parts; the exculpatory points end up not covering the weaknesses as much as they might, and so the poem is unsatisfactory on the whole, despite good technique. But the technique is there, as a building block for either editing or future poetry.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets III
In honor of Rosh Hashanah, which it is as of nightfall today wherever you may be, I'm going to analyze another of my old sonnets: specifically one from 2005 entitled "Tashlik," named for a ceremony traditionally performed on Rosh Hashanah.
They said to us: go down to riversides
And coasts and shores; wherever water flows,
Go ye where the clear blue stream arose
Or where the dark brown river mouth resides.
Bring with you crumbs of every shape and size,
Made from the corn that 'round your city grows,
That you do reap though, not a one that sows
Among you. Do you this when summer dies.
Go to the water, watch it as it runs
Beneath the sky that mirrors back the blue.
Then look inside, take that your own soul shuns,
The sin, the evil that abides in you.
Now grasp the corn, in crumbled mealy buns,
And cast it out. The water shall renew.
Mistakes Were Made:
I should probably start out by mentioning in preemptive defense that this poem was written intentionally in an archaic style. That does not excuse it from using that style poorly, however. Having just written a post mentioning that "ye" is hard to get away with in modern poetry, here I am guilty of that very crime; and it does not, in fact, work, although it might if the rest of the poem were good enough to carry it. It is not. "Do you this when summer dies," while a good rhyme for "size," is a terrible inversion; or even more so, simply an artificial insertion of "you" into a line that does not need it. "Corn" for grain is archaic, British and unnecessary, since grain and bread are both single-syllable (and the tradition involves baked grains, ie bread products). It's probably best as well to avoid words like 'round, unless the poem is informal, because eliding syllables is either informal or obnoxious - or both. But all of this is beating around the horrible, obvious elephant in the room (which is so bad that I had to mix those stock phrases just to get at how terrible it is): the tragedy that is lines 6-8. "Made from the corn that 'round your city grows,/That you do reap though, not a one that sows/Among you" is basically scraping the bottom of the barrel of imagination. The first line is fine, excepting the corn issue that has already been discussed; it's the inability to come up with another rhyme for grows, and also keep the sentence in some semblance of proper English syntax that creates the monster. The sentence ends up both snarled and senseless, with a little additional hint of pointlessness (and the "though" in the middle of line 7 sums everything up by having literally no reason to be there). The fact that lines 5 and 8 are a different rhyme from lines 1 and 4 in what is clearly supposed to be an Italian sonnet is just icing on this badly made cake.
Not Too Shabby:
Well, the heart is in the right place. Ignoring the corn issue, I actually like the last four lines. "The sin, the evil that abides in you" is a good line, as it both captures what is meant and hits the rhyme and meter perfectly; so is "and cast it out. The water shall renew." Basically, for me, those two lines make the poem, along with "then look inside, take that your own soul shuns;" they hit the meaning of tashlik and they hit the purity of the sonnet meter and rhyme scheme, fitting well into the architecture of the rest of the poem. Too bad that architecture is so flawed.
They said to us: go down to riversides
And coasts and shores; wherever water flows,
Go ye where the clear blue stream arose
Or where the dark brown river mouth resides.
Bring with you crumbs of every shape and size,
Made from the corn that 'round your city grows,
That you do reap though, not a one that sows
Among you. Do you this when summer dies.
Go to the water, watch it as it runs
Beneath the sky that mirrors back the blue.
Then look inside, take that your own soul shuns,
The sin, the evil that abides in you.
Now grasp the corn, in crumbled mealy buns,
And cast it out. The water shall renew.
Mistakes Were Made:
I should probably start out by mentioning in preemptive defense that this poem was written intentionally in an archaic style. That does not excuse it from using that style poorly, however. Having just written a post mentioning that "ye" is hard to get away with in modern poetry, here I am guilty of that very crime; and it does not, in fact, work, although it might if the rest of the poem were good enough to carry it. It is not. "Do you this when summer dies," while a good rhyme for "size," is a terrible inversion; or even more so, simply an artificial insertion of "you" into a line that does not need it. "Corn" for grain is archaic, British and unnecessary, since grain and bread are both single-syllable (and the tradition involves baked grains, ie bread products). It's probably best as well to avoid words like 'round, unless the poem is informal, because eliding syllables is either informal or obnoxious - or both. But all of this is beating around the horrible, obvious elephant in the room (which is so bad that I had to mix those stock phrases just to get at how terrible it is): the tragedy that is lines 6-8. "Made from the corn that 'round your city grows,/That you do reap though, not a one that sows/Among you" is basically scraping the bottom of the barrel of imagination. The first line is fine, excepting the corn issue that has already been discussed; it's the inability to come up with another rhyme for grows, and also keep the sentence in some semblance of proper English syntax that creates the monster. The sentence ends up both snarled and senseless, with a little additional hint of pointlessness (and the "though" in the middle of line 7 sums everything up by having literally no reason to be there). The fact that lines 5 and 8 are a different rhyme from lines 1 and 4 in what is clearly supposed to be an Italian sonnet is just icing on this badly made cake.
Not Too Shabby:
Well, the heart is in the right place. Ignoring the corn issue, I actually like the last four lines. "The sin, the evil that abides in you" is a good line, as it both captures what is meant and hits the rhyme and meter perfectly; so is "and cast it out. The water shall renew." Basically, for me, those two lines make the poem, along with "then look inside, take that your own soul shuns;" they hit the meaning of tashlik and they hit the purity of the sonnet meter and rhyme scheme, fitting well into the architecture of the rest of the poem. Too bad that architecture is so flawed.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets II
Here we shall approach another one of my own old sonnets (as usual, a much easier task than criticizing another's work, and almost as useful for the demonstration of good practice) with a sonnet on a different theme, in face the most common and as far as we can tell first sonnet theme: love. This does not have a title, except I suppose for the first line:
Were th'ethereal made solid, flesh sublim'd,
This jaunty verse reset as sullen prose,
And leadfoot prose made meter, quickly rhym'd,
The granite rocks come blooming like the rose,
The growing tree converted into stone,
Bread stay'd unrisen, meats made to expand,
While pencils take pen's inkings for their own,
Replacing them with graphite near at hand,
Should towers fall and tunnels rise to height
While pigs ascend and eagles tread the ground,
Be beacons dark while shadows are alight
And deaths be lost as lives become newfound,
Though all these changes come, one must remain:
My love's already sunny in the rain.
Mistakes Were Made:
I think it's pretty clear here that the diction is one of the largest problems with this sonnet. Intentional archaisms like "rhym'd" for "rhymed" and "sublim'd" for "sublimed," which do not in fact change the pronunciation of the words in question, is acceptable if a little silly. Attempting, as in the first line here, to axe out an entire syllable for metrical purposes via archaism ("th'ethereal") is simply too much. If we swallow that choice, the line is actually not that bad, I think, but that's like saying that if we ignore the radioactivity, late 1980s Chernobyl was a lovely vacation spot. Describing the verse as "jaunty" (line 2) is an attempt to face down this absurdity directly, but a failure is a failure no matter how it is massaged. "Leadfoot" in line 3 is also a gaudy neologism, whose greatest virtue may be that horror over it might stun the mind for the upcoming travesty of an inserted syllable in line 4: what on earth could it mean for something, rocks or otherwise, to "come blooming like the rose"? Say "bloom like a rose" and get the extra two syllables somewhere else. "Graphite near at hand" is an awfully stretched-for rhyme for "expand." These are the larger issues, next to which things like eagles that actually do tread the ground or the slight awkwardness of "pencils take pen's [sic; should be pens'] inkings for their own" pale in comparison. The conceit here may be acceptable, but it is certainly set in a manner that gives it few advantages and many demerits. It seems unable to decide if it is really supposed to be imagined as arising from a lost sixteenth-century text or if it is modern. On top of all of that, the final line is rushed; it takes an awful stretch to realize "my love's already sunny in the rain" is not only "love is already sunny" but also intended as a contrast with all the new topsy-turvydom above as an oxymoronic constant topsy-turvydom of its own. As I say, it is rushed, and ends up stretching for what should be an easy transition.
Not Too Shabby:
Well, it might be easy, based on the above, to simply toss this poem in the garbage can in the stereotypical way of writers on TV shows, crumpling up the paper into a little ball so that it flies more easily. But I actually like this poem, for two primary reasons. One, I think the conceit is actually fine; the idea, that even if everything else in the world is suddenly turned on its head, this love is so absurd and so contrary to expectation (and, in a sense, also so all-encompassing) that despite the change it would remain as it is, is I think a good one, and I think the examples express it well (except for their own internal diction issues). Two, I think that the poem flows well. Individual words sadly cause hiccups, and there is an overall failing of word choice and appropriateness, but for all of that the verse sweeps on its merry way; the end-stopped lines and English rhyme scheme allow each example to slot in naturally, and the balanced antithesis inside the lines with paired examples (and between the lines of paired longer examples) emphasizes this virtue. The word lengths and emphases are well-balanced; unlike the final line, none of the individual examples themselves are rushed in or seem neglected (or overemphasized). It might be hard to revamp the diction while retaining that effect, and the effect may heighten the disappointment of the rushed final payoff, but the current poem is one in which the examples successfully build precisely because of their use of the formal structure as a scaffold with which to ascend to greater and greater heights. The poem never falls flat or seems haphazardly constructed in regard to its larger conceit, only as regards the smaller building blocks, the individual words, and that particular dance is an interesting one to see accomplished, or at least attempted (if you disagree with my weighing of the two components relative importance). I see this as a poem that succeeds despite of, rather than because of, the individual words that make it up.
Were th'ethereal made solid, flesh sublim'd,
This jaunty verse reset as sullen prose,
And leadfoot prose made meter, quickly rhym'd,
The granite rocks come blooming like the rose,
The growing tree converted into stone,
Bread stay'd unrisen, meats made to expand,
While pencils take pen's inkings for their own,
Replacing them with graphite near at hand,
Should towers fall and tunnels rise to height
While pigs ascend and eagles tread the ground,
Be beacons dark while shadows are alight
And deaths be lost as lives become newfound,
Though all these changes come, one must remain:
My love's already sunny in the rain.
Mistakes Were Made:
I think it's pretty clear here that the diction is one of the largest problems with this sonnet. Intentional archaisms like "rhym'd" for "rhymed" and "sublim'd" for "sublimed," which do not in fact change the pronunciation of the words in question, is acceptable if a little silly. Attempting, as in the first line here, to axe out an entire syllable for metrical purposes via archaism ("th'ethereal") is simply too much. If we swallow that choice, the line is actually not that bad, I think, but that's like saying that if we ignore the radioactivity, late 1980s Chernobyl was a lovely vacation spot. Describing the verse as "jaunty" (line 2) is an attempt to face down this absurdity directly, but a failure is a failure no matter how it is massaged. "Leadfoot" in line 3 is also a gaudy neologism, whose greatest virtue may be that horror over it might stun the mind for the upcoming travesty of an inserted syllable in line 4: what on earth could it mean for something, rocks or otherwise, to "come blooming like the rose"? Say "bloom like a rose" and get the extra two syllables somewhere else. "Graphite near at hand" is an awfully stretched-for rhyme for "expand." These are the larger issues, next to which things like eagles that actually do tread the ground or the slight awkwardness of "pencils take pen's [sic; should be pens'] inkings for their own" pale in comparison. The conceit here may be acceptable, but it is certainly set in a manner that gives it few advantages and many demerits. It seems unable to decide if it is really supposed to be imagined as arising from a lost sixteenth-century text or if it is modern. On top of all of that, the final line is rushed; it takes an awful stretch to realize "my love's already sunny in the rain" is not only "love is already sunny" but also intended as a contrast with all the new topsy-turvydom above as an oxymoronic constant topsy-turvydom of its own. As I say, it is rushed, and ends up stretching for what should be an easy transition.
Not Too Shabby:
Well, it might be easy, based on the above, to simply toss this poem in the garbage can in the stereotypical way of writers on TV shows, crumpling up the paper into a little ball so that it flies more easily. But I actually like this poem, for two primary reasons. One, I think the conceit is actually fine; the idea, that even if everything else in the world is suddenly turned on its head, this love is so absurd and so contrary to expectation (and, in a sense, also so all-encompassing) that despite the change it would remain as it is, is I think a good one, and I think the examples express it well (except for their own internal diction issues). Two, I think that the poem flows well. Individual words sadly cause hiccups, and there is an overall failing of word choice and appropriateness, but for all of that the verse sweeps on its merry way; the end-stopped lines and English rhyme scheme allow each example to slot in naturally, and the balanced antithesis inside the lines with paired examples (and between the lines of paired longer examples) emphasizes this virtue. The word lengths and emphases are well-balanced; unlike the final line, none of the individual examples themselves are rushed in or seem neglected (or overemphasized). It might be hard to revamp the diction while retaining that effect, and the effect may heighten the disappointment of the rushed final payoff, but the current poem is one in which the examples successfully build precisely because of their use of the formal structure as a scaffold with which to ascend to greater and greater heights. The poem never falls flat or seems haphazardly constructed in regard to its larger conceit, only as regards the smaller building blocks, the individual words, and that particular dance is an interesting one to see accomplished, or at least attempted (if you disagree with my weighing of the two components relative importance). I see this as a poem that succeeds despite of, rather than because of, the individual words that make it up.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Sonnet Analysis: My Old Sonnets I
Let us start out the analysis side of this blog with something simple, at least in the simple-minded sense: one of my own older sonnets. First I'll post the sonnet, and then some analysis of what mistakes I made, and, if I'm lucky, anything I think went right (and why). Obviously when analyzing my own sonnets I will be emphasizing the mistakes more heavily than what went right; the opposite will be true when these analyses tackle other poets' work. We will start with a sonnet I have actually revised multiple times, but in its first form: this is War.
The thunder isn't thunder anymore
Now that the eyes have seen the dreadful guns
That threaten even now to end the war
By bringing down the walls. A child runs
Through streets that echo with the bugle's call.
He's screaming something, but nobody cares
For now the men are marching to the wall
In file, rank by rank, the endless pairs
Of booted feet make thunder of their own
To answer those without. The shrilling fife
And pounding drum beat down the panicked moan
Of poor civilians anxious for their life.
Yet naught hears he, the soldier with his pack,
But his own darling's whisper. Please come back.
Mistakes Were Made:
The most excruciating moment here is the end of line 12, where "their life," a forced rhyme with "fife," should really be lives - but fife's plural is fifes, not fives. There are also some extremely forced archaisms in this poem: "naught hears he" (line 13) is the worst, but "those without" (line 10) is hardly modern standard English either. It is generally better to avoid twisting syntax to fit the meter (as in "naught hears he") unless you happen to live in the 16th century, and similarly it is almost always better, unless a deliberate sense of antiquity is intended, to keep the word choice under control and contemporary to your own time. That doesn't mean only using simple words, but it does mean avoiding words (or meanings of words with multiple possible meanings) that have fallen substantially out of favor and have an archaic flavor. There are also a couple of moments - "his own darling's whisper" (line 14) and even "and pounding drum" (line 11) - where the poem seems to reach for extra syllables that end up seeming like wastes; we do not need to know it's his "own" darling, or that there are drums as well as fifes, except for the fact that the meter and form required additional syllables in those positions. Every syllable should help the poem, and it's arguable that these are merely placeholders.
Not Too Shabby:
I enjoy the effect of the enjambment after lines 1 and 4; there is a bit of suspense in each case about what exactly is meant, which is heightened in both cases by the ending of the line before the sense has run out. The substantial regularity of the meter reflects the marching of booted feet and the thunder of the cannon fairly well, and the one irregularity ("but nobody cares") creates a catch in the meter exactly where the sense also has a little hiccup - at the same moment we wonder why no one cares about the screaming child, we hit the irregularity in the verse, and as the explanation comes, so too the regularity reasserts itself in the verse. I'm also a fan of the sentiment of the last couplet, even though (as discussed above), its execution leaves something to be desired.
The thunder isn't thunder anymore
Now that the eyes have seen the dreadful guns
That threaten even now to end the war
By bringing down the walls. A child runs
Through streets that echo with the bugle's call.
He's screaming something, but nobody cares
For now the men are marching to the wall
In file, rank by rank, the endless pairs
Of booted feet make thunder of their own
To answer those without. The shrilling fife
And pounding drum beat down the panicked moan
Of poor civilians anxious for their life.
Yet naught hears he, the soldier with his pack,
But his own darling's whisper. Please come back.
Mistakes Were Made:
The most excruciating moment here is the end of line 12, where "their life," a forced rhyme with "fife," should really be lives - but fife's plural is fifes, not fives. There are also some extremely forced archaisms in this poem: "naught hears he" (line 13) is the worst, but "those without" (line 10) is hardly modern standard English either. It is generally better to avoid twisting syntax to fit the meter (as in "naught hears he") unless you happen to live in the 16th century, and similarly it is almost always better, unless a deliberate sense of antiquity is intended, to keep the word choice under control and contemporary to your own time. That doesn't mean only using simple words, but it does mean avoiding words (or meanings of words with multiple possible meanings) that have fallen substantially out of favor and have an archaic flavor. There are also a couple of moments - "his own darling's whisper" (line 14) and even "and pounding drum" (line 11) - where the poem seems to reach for extra syllables that end up seeming like wastes; we do not need to know it's his "own" darling, or that there are drums as well as fifes, except for the fact that the meter and form required additional syllables in those positions. Every syllable should help the poem, and it's arguable that these are merely placeholders.
Not Too Shabby:
I enjoy the effect of the enjambment after lines 1 and 4; there is a bit of suspense in each case about what exactly is meant, which is heightened in both cases by the ending of the line before the sense has run out. The substantial regularity of the meter reflects the marching of booted feet and the thunder of the cannon fairly well, and the one irregularity ("but nobody cares") creates a catch in the meter exactly where the sense also has a little hiccup - at the same moment we wonder why no one cares about the screaming child, we hit the irregularity in the verse, and as the explanation comes, so too the regularity reasserts itself in the verse. I'm also a fan of the sentiment of the last couplet, even though (as discussed above), its execution leaves something to be desired.
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