Early this morning
there was frost on the cattails,
the ones by the lake
where we used to canoe.
Everything was silver and old
in the new fragile light, and the hoar
reminded me of the sugar on your lips
that first time we kissed in June.
As for the daisies, they fell
a few weeks ago now
in the blue shadows of winter
and fragile fossilized autumn grass,
their sunny faces turned the color
of old fruit and ashen lips.
If this fog doesn’t lift by twilight,
everything else will melt
in the cold fire of setting suns
and the burn of stale sugar,
and tomorrow I’ll feed the cat and
wonder which flower you love now.
Author notes
I encourage all critiques and helpful comments. I would rather you ripped it to shreds than mindlessly praised it.
A contest entry
- Fossil by Danna Hobart.
375 points, ended September 30, 2007, 14 entries
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest - Free Verse or Prose Prewrites Only by Randomly Beautiful.
600 points, ended April 17, 2008, 11 entries
Honorable mention
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
This is still a baby - please help me teach it to walk.
Comments
1 - 14 of 14
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I love your work. Your imagery is always astonishing.
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Thanks!
And thanks for hosting a contest that gave me an excuse to sift through some of my older pieces! 
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Wow. This is a really good winter poem that you have penned here. I really like it. It is very colorful and I love your comparisions. You didn't bog it down with too many details or make it too abstract with too little clues. I thought you did a good job with this. But I'm not that great at critiqueing either. lol
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Now that I take a second look I guess there was only one spot I noticed that needed capitalization and that was the word Autumn. Overall it is a very good piece, sorry if I was a little over critical hehe. I would love for you to check out some of my work. My favorites I have written so far are Wordz... and Dying Slowly. Feel free to pick them apart. A little constructive critism never hurt n e one =)
--Vox -
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Don't worry about being over-critical lol. I only asked because I wanted to make sure I got it right. I believe autumn is only capitalized if s/he is being personified; here it is only the season. Thanks for taking the time to read critically. I will check out your work.
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Overall this is a good piece though it could use a bit of fine tuning. Nothing major just some capitalization and some minor sentence restructuring, although I am no one to judge, hehe. Thank you for sharing this with us I enjoyed reading it.
--Vox -
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Thanks and I'm glad you liked it. I'm not sure what you think needs capitalization, but if you want to point out specific trouble spots I will happily look at them. Cheers!
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A lovely prose. It says you encourage critiques, so I will let you know that I feel there are too many difinitive articles and conjunctions in it. Nearly all of them could be cut without changing the meaning of the piece in any way. For example:
in new, fragile light, the hoar
reminded me of sugar on your lips
in blue shadows of winter
I am also not sure that it works using the word "fragile" twice in so short a poem. I know that you also repeat the words "lips" and "sugar," but for some reason, those work for me whereas "fragile" doesn't.
But please don't feel I am being overly critical because the piece has beautiful imagery and metaphor in it. Thank you so much for entering.
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Huh, I didn't even realize I had used fragile twice. Thanks for pointing that out...I don't usually do that. And I think you're probably right on the rest of it, as well...I've actually been looking at slimming it down a bit lately, but haven't gotten it ready to repost or anything yet. Thanks for your honest comments and for the great contest!
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so i take it this is about love, but i didn't get that until i read the very last line. my favorite line would definitely be "fragile fossilized autumn grass". excellent. great job with metaphors and describing things non-literally, which I love. i like how the title isn't just a line from the poem-I admit to doing that frequently, but I like that the title is different so you are forced to think about how the title relates to the poem. in the end not my favorite topic, but it's doubtlessly well-written and I can certainly respect the piece. nice job
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A literate and intelligent poem with some excellent lines. Not at all what I would have expected from a contest with the theme of "fossil" (guess I was taking the theme literally), but I can see the connection--your poem is all about memory and wistful reminiscence, and a fossil is, after all, a memory frozen in time.
I would leave the line about the cat--it introduces a necessary note of contrapuntal domesticity, a reminder that the ordinary aspects of life have to be taken care of, despite our feelings. Your poem is a pleasure to read.
Bill
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Very imaginative.
My first impression is that this is very imagnitive, but I wonder just what the cat has to do with this. Emotionally I feel the depth of longing you have for the person you are talking about. This is not awkward, however I would leave the line about the cat out of this as it does not add anything to this. The title is algight and the first line works with this. The last line is real good. My favorite part is all of this.
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I didn't even think of the cat like that. He was kind of my tie to the first line (about cattails) and my symbol of having moved on (having someone else to care for). I don't know, maybe I should leave him out, like you say. Maybe I just love cats Thanks for your comments and for being honest.
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Such wonderful imagry. Very well written. I can feel the longing.
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