Great lumbering giant
a large gray beast; massive
mound of flesh towering above
the other creatures on the plains.
Sounding your bugle for all,
a loud audible blast
of much power able to
humble those nearby.
Majestic one, your grace crushes
dirt underfoot, packing the savanna
even lions cower, shy away from them.
Gentle, giant beings of regal status;
not to make souvenirs of their ivory.
Such docile animals should be left
to roam free in their territory.
Supporting their wee calves,
nurturing younglings
with care and love.
To grow stronger
and be adults.
Tender mothers
loving fathers
that care.
Author notes
I (Zephyr Aryn) just felt like making an elephant-shaped poem...when someone sarcastically suggested it. This one was REALLY fun to align properly. It could use some work, perhaps...this is my second form poem. (I think my first one turned out better, so I submitted this one.)
A contest entry
- Awaken my Mind by Silent Cougar.
950 points, ended May 28, 2007, 27 entries
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest - Poems and Critiques (A two part contest) by Deviant Dreamer.
700 points, ended June 6, 2007, 10 entries
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
Just say what you feel needs telling...or have one of those random whims to comment on something.
Comments
1 - 12 of 12
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Love the shape!
It must be very hard to find enough characters for each line to make the shape... do you pre-plan the shape or just kind of write and let it happen?
Now on to the critique:
Misspelling on "majestic" in line 10.
A poem like this could be very clear without the some of the pronouns. I don't think you really need most of them.
Example: LINE 11 - even lions cower, shy away [from them]
Some awkward lines:
9 Crushing the dirt underfoot of
10 such a magestic one on the savanna
Maybe rephrase:
Majestic one, your grace crushes
dirt underfoot, packing the savanna
You've inspired me to try this form... my rephrase suggestion above has the same character count as your lines 9 and 10... it's quite a puzzle figuring out how to make that work.
Overall, I was really amused by this. Made me smile!
I wrote an elephant poem, too:
http://allpoetry.com/poem/2956914
Best of luck in the contest!
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Thanks for the advice. I kind of preplanned it on a piece of paper, writing it in a shaped format. Of course, I had to do some tweaking to get it to work... You can make shaped poetry any way you want to; any shape or whatever. On here, though, you need to edit it over and over because the fonts are different from the edit page to the poetry page. You might have to mess the image up and play with it in the edit screen and play with it so it works on the poetry screen. Just giving you a heads up if you decide to try it out.
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yeah
great job at doing the elephant shape -
Alright, first of all, I just have to say, that I love elephants. They're my favorite animal, and though I highly doubt that you care, I just wanted to throw that out there.
Is the elephant shape, the form, or is there some other rules behind it? I'm very form ignorant, so if there's something else, I don't know it.
In the line:
"to roam free on their territory."
I would suggest that you change 'on' to 'in'. Just since a territory is a place. Also, there was a little bit of a POV mix-up. In the line:
"Sounding your bugle for all,"
you use second person (your) but in the line:
'not to make souvenirs of our ivory." You use first person (our). Since you use the word 'their' a lot through out the poem, I would suggest just simply changing the 'our' to 'their'.
This is a very different poem. I certainly have never read a poem about an elephant before. Maybe a dog or a bird...
Anyhow, good luck in the contest. See ya' 'round!
-Khourey
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Thanks for your help. I'm glad you cared enough to offer some consturctive criticism. About form poetry...you can pretty much do what you want as long as it looks like something. The form is pretty free.
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well if this is the result of a sarcastic remark, I would love to see something created by anger. This is cleverly done, and brings to mind, the plight of such great animals. one small change will finish this off tho, 'not to make souvenirs our of (of our) ivory'.
otherwise, a great piece, thank you for entering.
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Oops-thanks for catching me. I'm surprised no one else said anything. Glad you did.
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*cheering*
I love spectator sports. Like...form poetry, like this...because I have nowhere NEAR the patience for it. I admire your talent, and envy your skill! Bravo!
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I don't see any trunk...lol. I really admire shape poetry. I tried and failed. Great job!
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There is a trunk-it's just hard to see. It goes: audible, power, those, your. Maybe you'll see it a little better if I told you this.
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wow this is soooo amazing!!! this is pure art. i love how symbloic and well worded it is, it truely deserves to be in a book of some sort. they way that you made the poem flow with such great description while still creating an image of the animal with words is amazing to me, really
great job
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