You were a charcoal sketch
I had you, manipulated your form
Arranged your position
From your lavender haven
You wandered off the page
Askew and abandoning
As ashes and embers
Adrift there you sifted
Through the rays of sunlight
Longing for more, so you said
Your desire like Mount Vesuvius
Over cobbles and courts
And so you roamed
over Pompeii
Just an abbozzo
Vineyards ablaze before you
And as a blanket
You covered and enveloped all kinds
You wanted to be thick and
dimensional, like an oil painting
Rich with just desserts
Tasting vernaccia to your core
Feeling atoms within your
Alanine and yet you have
no chemistry,
You are a lavender scent
A flitting emotion
A passing wave
And then you are gone
But, my dear abbozzo
not before you cover and
suffocate all that tried to
contain you.
Only I can grant you
permanence as I press
you to the page
Author notes
Prompt: Abozzo-preliminary sketch (Italian)
Other words that need to be defined
Vernaccia-white wine cultivated in Tuscany
Alanine-Italian for biochemistry
A contest entry
- Word of the Day IV by Gaffer.
450 points, ended November 5, 2008, 10 entries
Gold trophy winner
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
What in the world is this talking about?
Comments
1 - 17 of 17
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woah. i love this a lot. whenever i draw with charcoal ill remember this poem and be like 'wow. i just drew all those words' lol i dunno it made sense in my mind <3
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Forgot to applaud... whoops
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Wow, you honor me not only with my first gold but also your deep praise and dimensional analysis. Thank you for pondering my piece so. So pleased that I managed to dig to your core!
Blue~
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Sorry it has taken me so long to comment on this piece, but I wanted to make sure I had enough time to write down everything I wanted to say.
I really love the imagery, metaphor and personification of this poem. Sometimes I am convinced that it is personifying a sketch, yet other times I think maybe it is about a real women, and that she is being likened to a sketch metaphorically. Whichever way it is supposed to be, it was neat to read it both ways.
Love the lines "askew and abandoning / as ashes and embers". Really great word choice and contrast between the first line having more direct, consonant sounds, and the second line having very melodious, vowel sounds.
The description of the sketch roaming over cobbles and courts was well done, and I think you fit the word abbozzo in there very nicely. The setting really helped with that as well. You really made an effort to create this Italian setting where that word would not seem odd or misplaced at all. That being said, I did not care for the word "alanine". I'm not sure why. It is just so long and I didn't really think it flowed with the rest of that line. I do enjoy the talk of chemistry, but perhaps it would have worked better as simply "Feeling atoms within you / and yet you have no chemistry".
Love the part "you wanted to be thick and dimensional, like an oil painting / rich with just desserts / tasting vernaccia to you core". I thought it really captured the longing of the sketch to be real, of the woman's want to be something more.
I think my very favourite part of this poem is "not before you cover and / suffocate all that tried to / contain you". Really well done. A line that can be taken in many ways and really makes you think.
The ending stanza was very good as well. Love the "p" alliteration and the image of pressing her into the page.
All-in-all, I thoroughly enjoyed it. And the more I read it, the more meaning and hidden imagery I take from it
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Well I'm glad it worked in your favor;
I actually hate doing critiques, but if it helped then yay
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Beautiful!
I love the Italian words.
This was like fine art lass....
I thought the the flow was done well..
There was a flowing immediacy to the descriptions of the senses...
You have returned romance back to this site....
Much love my sister,
Liam
[lowell]
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I really just think some of the lines could do without line breaks, maybe commas instead, & punctuation will also help guide readers into a steady flow when reading. like for example, the first few lines could turn into:
"You were a charcoal sketch;
I had you,
manipulated your form
and arranged your position.
From your lavender haven
you wandered off the page,"
I could go on & on, but I'll stop there. Lol. I'm just huge on punctuation & arrangement of lines.
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Thank you for honest critique, changed and I believe I like that much better
Blue~
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I absolutely loved the romantic imagery of this with the artistic vocabulary, but it didn't flow quite right to me :/ the lines are kinda choppy & stumbly, & lots of times that doesn't bother me. but with such a sensual piece i feel it really hinders the potential. other than that i absolutely loved it ♥
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I completely agree with you about the flow, however I am baffled on how to improve it. Have any suggestions?
Blue
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this was such a well flowing poem and the wording was fantastic, you bring up such persistent questions through your poetry
once again a brilliant poem -
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Thank you for the read! Much appreciated!
Blue
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yet another gem full of sparkling linguistic facets.
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Beautiful
Lovely poem. Your imagery was intense and tangible, from the cobbles and courts to the blazing vineyards.
“From your lavender haven you wandered off the page” is a beautiful line. Great job. -
Title it Charcoal Sketch.
I reckon it fits nicely.
As for thew poem, I din't really understand of the words...I want to learn Italian...
But I really liked the way it fit togther, the way it flowed... -
Me likes it...
...a lots
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This is a really great poem, i love it, ur so talented u really are, I hope u never stop writing it would be an absolute shame
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