Sacred Woods - Third Edit

[beaufort]

Sacred Woods -Third Edit

The woods stand sacred, cloaked in snow
glimmering now and bright, although
the chilly wind portends the night
and winter sun falls deep and low.

And here the ice and frost amass,
translucent pearls bind tight tall grass,
that glow in waning shreds of light
like swirling, twinkling beads of glass.

The doe and stag stand in the glade
side by side this night, afraid
of nothing here - a peaceful sight,
the swaying boughs their serenade.

These sacred woods, in deep moonlight
protect all these and more each night-
ice-embroidered blankets tight
swaddling each in bands of white.

Sacred Woods

The woods stand sacred, cloaked in snow,
glimmering now and bright, although
the chilly wind portends the night
and winter sun falls deep and low.

And here the ice and frost amass,
translucent pearls entwine tall grass
they glow in waning shreds of light
like swirling, twinkling shards of glass.

The doe and stag stand in the glade
side by side for warmth, afraid
of nothing here – in pine and snow,
the whip-poor-will their serenade.

These sacred woods, enshrined in white
protect all these and more each night -
ice-embroidered blankets laid
swaddling each in bands of white.


Winter Refuge

The woods stand sacred, bathed in snow,
glimmering now and bright, although
the evening wind portends the night
and russet sun falls slowly, low.

And here the ice and frost amass,
translucent pearls entwine tall grass
glowing in last shreds of light
like twirling, twinkling shards of glass.

The doe and stag stand in the glade
side by side for warmth, afraid
of nothing here – in pine and snow,
dove’s lullaby a serenade.

These sacred woods, enshrined in white
protect all these and more each night -
ice-embroidered blankets bright
swaddle each in bands of white.

[beaufort]

If this is sophmoric and sappy please say so - no thin skin here.

[Todd]

Linda, why do you think your work may be sappy and sophomoric?

If you truly feel that way, fix those elements and repost.

I think the piece sounds nice and has pretty language. I wouldn't call it sophomoric. I'm not sure there's much surprising about it, but that isn't always a flaw. If it had one main flaw it may be originality in execution (originality of idea is impossible to avoid as most things have been done already).

I don't dislike it though. I'm not sure that helps you at all, but those are my thoughts.

Best,

Todd

[ChristopherSea]

I think this a good framework for the lovely snowscape you are painting!
Winter Refuge

The woods stand sacred, bathed in snow, <'cloaked in snow' would make better sense>
glimmering now and bright, although
the evening wind portends the night
and russet sun falls slowly, low. <as a painter 'russet' is not the best choice for a sunset, but I can see the orange and purple separately>
<'slowly, low' is a bit awkward>

And here the ice and frost amass, <'ice and frost' are the same, 'ice and snow'?>
translucent pearls entwine tall grass
glowing in last shreds of light
like twirling, twinkling shards of glass. <you can add sound and extend alliteration with 'swirling, tinkling shards of glass'>

The doe and stag stand in the glade
side by side for warmth, afraid
of nothing here – in pine and snow,
dove’s lullaby a serenade. <'their serenade' could add some deer romance, ha>

These sacred woods, enshrined in white
protect all these and more each night -

ice-embroidered blankets bright
swaddle each in bands of white.

Some ideas for your next edit. See what you think. Cheers/Chris

[beaufort]

Nothing like a little deer romance! Thanks for the feedback, Chris. I will do a rewrite and include your suggestions.

Todd, sorry I can't spell sophomoric. Medical school was poor training for spelling/poetry. I like formal meter, trying to learn about it, but realize just because I like this does not mean it is good (not in the subjective sense, but in terms of form, meter, structure, etc.). Working at it. Thanks for your comments.

[ThePinsir]

I'm to too thrilled with the title. "Refuge" makes me think that something bad is going on, like a war or disaster, that there are refugees in the forest. That would be cool, but that doesn't seem to be at all what the poem is about.

Other than that, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The rhyme scheme is clever and parts of it have decent meter.

[Malu]

Winter Refuge

The woods stand sacred, bathed in snow, Good start, nice imagery.
glimmering now and bright, although Not a very common style, to have the sentence come to a pause and then one word at the end of the line. I see that it was this way for the intent of the rhyme, I enjoyed and find this style to be pretty unique.
the evening wind portends the night
and russet sun falls slowly, low. "slowly, low" without the comma it would read rather bad, however I still think it doesn't flow very well.

And here the ice and frost amass,
translucent pearls entwine tall grass Great!
glowing in last shreds of light
like twirling, twinkling shards of glass.

The doe and stag stand in the glade
side by side for warmth, afraid Again with the unique style, nice to see the uniformity and structure of this piece work so well.
of nothing here – in pine and snow,
dove’s lullaby a serenade. glade=one syllable, afraid=two syllables, serenade=three syllables, I wonder was that intentional? I think its pretty cool how it turned out that way.

These sacred woods, enshrined in white The first few words of this poem are "The woods stand sacred" so I think this can be reworded to be different.
protect all these and more each night -
ice-embroidered blankets bright
swaddle each in bands of white. white used the second time in this stanza, I think that can be altered as to not take away from the meaning of each word. Also the third line rhymes with the rest of this stanza. All the previous stanzas have the third line not rhyme with the other three lines. For these reasons I find this last stanza to be the weakest and I think a few changes can make this poem look completely uniform.

All in all, I enjoyed the imagery very well. Just made some critique in bold, hope they help.

[beaufort]

Originally I called it "Sacred Woods", maybe I'll go back to that. Will try to sort the decent from the indecent. Thanks for the feedback.

---

Thanks to all for the feedback. I appreciate it and am aiming to improve.

[Kamui079]

I like the cold but inviting scene it portrays. I feel like you try to make the environment a tad warmer than I feel it should get credit for though. You want to paint a lovely winter scene, but I feel there should be a touch more winter wildness communicated through it. Really enjoy it though, thanks for sharing!

[HSquires426]

Winter Refuge

The woods stand sacred, bathed in snow,
glimmering now and bright, although
the evening wind portends the night I was originally going to criticize this because the poem is set in winter, but on second thought it is one of the best images here, and I feel as though I know exactly what you're getting at here. Nice!
and russet sun falls slowly, low. This has been echoed above, but russet is not traditionally a color used in this fashion. It is a delicious potato, however.

And here the ice and frost amass,
translucent pearls entwine tall grass
glowing in last shreds of light
like twirling, twinkling shards of glass.

The doe and stag stand in the glade
side by side for warmth, afraid
of nothing here – in pine and snow, probably nitpicky, but I think you could drop 'here' from this line and not lose anything from the poem
dove’s lullaby a serenade. lullaby a serenade strikes me as redundant. I know it's done for rhyming purposes but even so...

These sacred woods, enshrined in white
protect all these and more each night -
ice-embroidered blankets bright
swaddle each in bands of white. I would change swaddle to 'swaddling' just for grammatical purposes

Overall I liked it quite a bit! Thanks for sharing

[dusboss]

I like the image your poem made in my mind, somehow it reminds me of Christmas, at least my vision of it, there is the picture of frozen nature on peak of a mountain with no people around. "The sacred woods" is what makes this poem a little bit more mystical and divine which I really like. Great poem as far as I'm concerned.

[alatos]

I adore this poem. It uses fantastic imagery, and I think the rhythm is very nice. As a novice, I feel there is nothing I could advise you to change.

[Mikeodial]

Winter Refuge

The woods stand sacred, bathed in snow,
glimmering now and bright, although
the evening wind portends the night
and russet sun falls slowly, low.

And here the ice and frost amass,
translucent pearls entwine tall grass
glowing in last shreds of light
like twirling, twinkling shards of glass.

The doe and stag stand in the glade
side by side for warmth, afraid
of nothing here – in pine and snow,
dove’s lullaby a serenade.

These sacred woods, enshrined in white
protect all these and more each night -
ice-embroidered blankets bright
swaddle each in bands of white.

The serene scene you paint reminds me of New Hampshire winter landscapes.
The imagery is clear, showing how coldness can be beauty. Perhaps you can add something of the silence that makes this sacred in nature. Perhaps a cracking branch falling due or an indicator that when broken the silence is really noticed.
The title might be better served by Standing Sacred, as the two animals are motionless in the snowscape; conveying the mystical nature of winter and participants in the woods.

[beaufort]

Thanks to all who have replied - I appreciate your feedback and have incorporated it into a new edited version. Best.

[Mitya]

This poem has an interesting rhyme scheme. The first two lines and the last line of each stanza all rhyme. The third line of each stanza, however, breaks with the others.

There is almost a rhyme scheme shared between these lines in each stanza, but it is inconsistent. It doesn't have the same feel in the second stanza as it does in the first. This is probably because 'bright' is so close to 'night'.

The second stanza doesn't have any similar word to evoke internal rhyme with 'light,' however. You could fix this by changing 'translucent pearls entwine tall grass' to something like 'translucent pearls bind tight, tall grass'.

The third stanza avoids the internal rhyme problem all together, because of the alliteration between 'snow' and 'serenade'. The two 's' sounds keep the stanza together, and prevent that awkward feeling of disjointedness in the second stanza. Excellent.

The fourth stanza, on the other hand, rhymes 'white' in the first line with 'white' in the last. You might want to find a different end word in either the 1st or 4th line.

The structure of the rhyme scheme in that fourth stanza is an excellent choice. Going ABBA would work to frame the thought. It would signal closure, and bring the poem to a gentle end.

By not repeating white, then, you avoid calling attention to it. That sort of subtlety is to be desired in poems like this.

It's a very silent, almost stoic poem. The reader can feel the silence, the hushed movements, and the gentle crush of snow. The ending is much like this as well, as soft and delicate as a single snowflake falling into water.

[trophos]

Nice rhyme scheme and meter - you found a good balance between keeping meter and having it sound like natural language. Mixing the rhymes was an interesting choice - I expected that the third line of each stanza would hold constant because of the '-ight' in stanzas 1 and 2 - to my ear, a poem of this length should either have a constant there or, if anything, should vary only in the last stanza. This is further confused by the fact that the third line of stanza 4 rhymes with the main rhymes of stanza 3.

The woods stand sacred, cloaked in snow,
glimmering now and bright, although --- I like the enjambment here, it moves the scene forward nicely
the chilly wind portends the night
and winter sun falls deep and low.

And here the ice and frost amass,
translucent pearls entwine tall grass --- you want some kind of punctuation here - a semicolon would work, or probably a comma
they glow in waning shreds of light --- I'm torn on shreds of light - on one hand, it's new and interesting visually, but it also is such a mixed metaphor
like swirling, twinkling shards of glass. --- this image is less fresh than many of your others, and 'shreds of light' followed by 'shards of glass' doesn't sound right - not close enough to work as a kind of echo, not different enough to not draw attention to itself. Actually 'shreds of light' might work better if you change that last line to a more parallel image

The doe and stag stand in the glade
side by side for warmth, afraid --- another nice enjambment
of nothing here – in pine and snow,
the whip-poor-will their serenade. --- jokes of deer romance aside (lol), this line isn't working for me - in part I don't think it follows well from 'in pine and snow,' in part I think the agency you've given them (i.e. that they're serenading) doesn't fit with the rest of the imagery of the poem - it's so busy, after all that stillness

These sacred woods, enshrined in white
protect all these and more each night -
ice-embroidered blankets laid --- I like this image
swaddling each in bands of white. --- someone already mentioned it, but rhyming white with white is a bit off - I would switch the first one and keep the 'bands of white'

Thanks for sharing

[beaufort]

Thanks for your feedback. I'll be posting an edited version one of these days- will try to incorporate these suggestions. Appreciate it!

[Blake]

I agree that this is an outstanding poem and the use of imagery is very good indeed. There is nothing that jumps out at me that I would change personally.