I cannot see by light of candle
Nor by the fire’s dance
I only seek the stars above me
Their light a shining lance
The road I walk is full of choices
The life I live they rule
If I should falter in my journey
Tears of pain form a pool
But with your love I will not falter
Steadfast I will be true
The love we share will always keep us
As stars in midnight blue
I cannot see without your passion
The stars burn brighter still
They shed their light and open passage
Our hearts they speed to fill
Now onward t’wards the journey coming
The sun shines down on us
We travel with the west wind blowing
The end, our journey blest
Lend- journey (Sindaran Elvish)
Author notes
A song written for a story I am working on. It is set in ME and Tolkien's universe. The song is sung at the betrothal of a young girl. Just a note: the elves lived by starlight, before the sun was created. Therefore, they place much store in the stars. I hope this helps the understanding a bit more.
Written September 17th, 2004
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I am partial to it. LOL And, but for a couple of punctuation changes, I have not done anything else. But, this is why I tend to avoid metered rhyming endevours. I am just better, I think, at abstracts ramblings. (Although one guy said a poem was bunny and I should have thrown it away. I read some of his, and decided his "expert" opinion could have applied to some of his work."
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I love it! It has everything .... great rhyme and flow. I thought it was romantic as well...it read as smooth as silk to me. Maybe I'm missing something here, but I think it is simply wonderful just as it is and I wouldn't change a thing... critiques or not!
I can definetly hear this as a song... sweet and beckoning... 
~Frog
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Well, this is the only one of two I have written without actual music, so I guess it would be just a poem. And what is a song without music but a poem. And a song is not meant to be carried by the music alone. When I sing, I can change the rhythm of the song just by how I do pronounce the words and set the stresses. It is a marriage between the two. One, without the other is just music or a poem. It is the two together that make it a song. But, thank you for the comment. And I think the word you were looking for was fault, not default.
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I don't think you can critique a song the way you critique a poem. A song is meant to be carried by the music itself, and defaults in rhythm (when read) can be made up for when you sing because pronunciation can be lengthened or shortened as necessary.
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Actually, that is just the way it came out. I did not change it at all to post to the non-LOTR sites. It is just a love song. See what real constructive criticism can do? I never realized how that really reads. I know, because I wrote it. Duh! But I can see where a reader would be lost. I will have to think more on this. You have no idea how scary this was for me. My poetry is mine and anything anyone says about it will roll off my back, and I may tell them tough noogies. But the fantasy stuff, that is very hard on me. So, I appreciate your kindness in your criticism. And I do admit to being a closet fanfic writer, at least here. I have the feeling most people look down on it. I just love the setting. It demands romance and honour. And I am not talking about the stuff at ff.net; although, I am posted there, and there are some good things to read. Once again, thank you.
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It is, indeed, an abcb rhyme scheme. Didn't make any remarks on that, though on most rhyming poems I do (kudos on that, by the way).
I read this poem about halfway through, and then I scrolled down to the author's notes section, to see if I could glean anything from what you'd said about it. The remark about it helped a lot. In more "academic" or "literary" circles, fanfiction type stuff is generally looked down upon. (Much to my sadness -- now I'm looking to submit something for this mondo huge scholarship and I'm realizing that half my fiction is fanfiction -- woe!) So if you're trying to make this generic enough such that people not in the LoTR fancircle will accept it, appreciate it, etc., you have a bit of work to do.
Stanza four, I think the main thing was the bridge in logic between line one and line two -- yes, you're talking about light, but ... I don't know, I'm just picky about things when it could be misconstrued another way. Because I'm fond of misconstruing things. Heh. -
Okay, I see your point about the commas. I am so used to trying to read other's work without benefit of punctuation, I tend to go overboard. And this particular poem did not have a beta.
I am not sure I understand your first comment. Is this not what is considered an abcb rhyming scheme? And what circle does it work in, and what does it not?
As for stanza four, it does make sense if you know that the elves lived by the stars. No sun. So, they look to the stars for their light. I guess I should explain that. I am not used to posting to generic sites. Most of my fantasy things are posted to subject specific sites. I can fix that. I do thank you for the pointers. -
For the context you are setting it in, I suppose it works. By suppose I mean it wouldn't work in any other literary circle. At least not how it is now.
You do have the lyric feel working very well here, but you already knew that. Examine where you're using punctuation -- for example, in stanza two, line four, you're using a comma to make up for the fact that "form" should be conjugated such that there would be another syllable. There were a few other funky spots I noticed later on, like "love, I" and "share, will" -- you don't need commas in either of those two spots.
Make sure not to compromise flow and sense -- stanza four could use work, in that respect. -
I like the tone and rhythm to your poem. "Nor by the fire’s dance" is my favorite line. Nicely done.
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Nice, I'm not a metered rhyme loving person, but it's a nice write.
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