Lycanthropy

[ChristopherSea]

Noticed the use of form here - it's very sweet. The rhythm is nice. It's strange that you'd pick iambic tetrameter, though, for this poem, which is so violent. It's bouncy. I'm expecting a joke by the fourth line of each verse, not 'never pity my abject soul.' I wonder if you chose it intentionally, as a juxtaposition - regardless, I do not really feel it works.


The poem would benefit from clarity exponentially. It's very vague. If it wasn't for the title I would have thought this was a poem about a rapist or something like that. It'd have taken me all the way to wolfsbane and hemlock to get any clue that this was about a wolfman if it wasn't for the title.

To me, really, the poem really comes into its own in stanza 4. The first three stanzas are too vague to really mean anything or be very threatening. You seem to have been preoccupied trying to come up with poetic ways to say 'I am a werewolf'. At stanza 4, though, it lights up; I have never seen lycanthropy treated in this way before, which is good. 'Come unto me with poisons and narcotics!' - it's a very interesting angle. My advice is start there. That's a strong start and it keeps that strength up until the end. A tortured old werewolf saying: get me drunk and kill me.

Laura, I really appreciate the detailed read, analysis and critique that you have done! You are spot on as to what is going on herein (even though you say you don’t get it completely) and I am glad that you are intrigued by the alternate point of view. Who wants the same old werewolf poem anyway? One can look at this as a self aware monster and not very pleased with his actions and lot in life. He also considers his state a chronic disease, but knows that it is not terminal, although he wishes it so. That should answer most of your queries.

Specific explanations follow. He dreads the poet’s moon because albeit many times our inspiration it is of course his bane. His cellular structure is altered, hence that final line in S1. Wolves travel on all fours, but they bed that way as well. I don’t need or want to say ‘I am a werewolf’. He wishes to dull his senses, stop the transformation or die to stop the madness and the bloodshed. There nothing vague, it should be clear. If you falter in killing the Lycanthrope, you shall surely die. Know exactly what to do and follow through with it or else. The narrator is just stating the facts. Since he has killed his own daughter (another motivation for him wanting to die), he is warning you to watch your own. Follow through with his plea or suffer the consequences. He is speaking as the man with a conscience an a morality and warning you of the beast that neither speaks nor feels anything human.

As for the meter, I shall most likely modify according to your recommendations. I follow no formal style and just compose by ear. That fact that it is loosely iambic tetrameter is ironic as I just posed a question in the discussion forum as how to go about composing a poem in iambic pentameter.

Thanks again and I will credit you in my next edit! Cheers/Chris

Just an observation - this poem is in no way even loosely iambic or tetrameter, it is something called free verse.

It makes sense, since I made no effort or claim to have used any rhythmic structure or form of meter.