Miss Bennet,
I've often been told before
that I have a gift for eloquency
when it comes to writing things; so
as it stands, I wish to make my motives
clear.
Miss Eliza Bennet,
You said once, at a Netherfield ball,
before leaving me lost in your
critical and breathtaking gaze,
your sharpened tongue,
and hair tied up in wild chestnut curls,
that poetry, when fed to only
a vague inclination of love,
would simply kill it stone dead -
well,
Miss Bennet,
a vague inclination
this most certainly is
not.
Miss Eliza,
Have you ever felt such feelings
that were impossible to convey?
I thought perhaps the paper would help
(for when I'm in your presence,
my words seem to fall over one another
in a feverish frenzy),
but my words are chopped, and
the ink seems to be overflowing with an emotion
that I regularly do not express out loud.
Now, can you see,
how terrifying it is,
this effect you have on me?
Is it possible to scream with passion
using only verse?
My Dearest Elizabeth,
I regret to inform you that shall never
give you such an embarassingly ardent
display of my affection to you.
This parchment shall be crumpled soon,
tossed into the fire of my study
to lay among the soft, gentle ashes
where words expressing the pains of
unrequited love have often lain before.
I shall be on call here,
should you decide to need me,
for anything at all, my dear -
I would be by your side in a heartbeat.
Eliza, in short,
I simply wish with all my stony heart,
that for once you would glance my way
without daggers in your eyes.
Author notes
Yes, I LOVE Pride and Prejudice, as you can probably tell. More than my heart can express in words.
But I decided to do something new and make a poem from Mr. Darcy's point of view, of a poem that he struggled to write and eventually never sent to Elizabeth. I hope you like it, and I'd love feedback.
A contest entry
- In the Name of Jane Austen by Nicolette Everett.
1500 points, ended May 26, 2008, 10 entries
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
I'M FREE.
Comments
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I love how you convey the poem from Mr. Dracys' point of view. You give him emotion where many people don't see it.
The flow I think could have been in a little better.
Nice job though! -
Ah if he had indeed written this and sent it, then we would have no movie lol or book, for the love story would have unfolded a lot early than it did. I have always been intrigued how love can hold back due to people's morals and ignorance of things back then. Very well done. Love, C
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This is very good and I can see that sultry looking man wresting with his inner thoughts and furiously scribbling away, only to throw it in the open fire. Would that I could write thus. A most gracious write, indeed.
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Jings! Yes, absolutely... I can't think that Darcy, even with his upbringing, could flow in iambic pentameter... All his repressed feeling - still repressed - is in this lovely poem!
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