A poem for Twelfth Night

[MAE27]

Sad Tree
 
Your sparkly baubles dangle,
Sad droopy tree,
Your star is staring down,
On a needle sea.
 
On a naked new year’s day,
We strip you bare,
Though maids still milk,
We do not care.
 
We drag you,
Through corridors,
Down stairs,
Bump after thud,
Disfigured.

To leave you,
Forgotten,
Undistinguishable,
And entangled,
In a pile of sad trees.

[The anti-anthropocentrist]

Very clear.

I get the 'usage' of the tree. It is very easy to understand and apply this idea of usage to other components of life. However the title of 'Sad tree' may be a little too clear, I believe that there is room for development. This tree to me is not just a sad tree, but one of many sad trees.

"In a pile of sad trees." What caused the tree to be sad? Was it sad from the beginning or was it that it only took 3 glasses of wine for Wayno's (some random character I just made up) mother in law to snarl at him causing a family fracas? Is it by design that this tree and trees before it are this way, or is it the product of some repetitive process?

[Achebe]

Sad Tree
 
Your sparkly baubles dangle,  
Sad droopy tree, ... shades of Keats's 'In drear nighted December, too happy happy tree'? like the allusion, whether intended or not
Your star is staring down,
On a needle sea.
 
On a naked new year’s day,. why is the new year's day naked? 
We strip you bare,
Though maids still milk, ...can't see how maids milking is connected to anything in the poem.
We do not care. ...see above
 
We drag you, ...you are getting into the tree's demise too soon...see below
Through corridors,
Down stairs,
Bump after thud,
Disfigured.

To leave you,
Forgotten, ...I have not invested enough emotion into the tree to empathise with it. It is not familiar enough to me. I will not miss it. Its being forgotten doesn't make a difference to me. As a reader, you're losing me at this point.
Undistinguishable,..weak abstraction 
And entangled,
In a pile of sad trees. ..nice

nice idea overall. but yeah, the tree dies too soon in the poem.

[MAE27]

Sad Tree
 
Your sparkly baubles dangle,  
Sad droopy tree, ... shades of Keats's 'In drear nighted December, too happy happy tree'? like the allusion, whether intended or not
Your star is staring down,
On a needle sea.
 
On a naked new year’s day,. why is the new year's day naked? 
We strip you bare,
Though maids still milk, ...can't see how maids milking is connected to anything in the poem.
We do not care. ...see above
 
We drag you, ...you are getting into the tree's demise too soon...see below
Through corridors,
Down stairs,
Bump after thud,
Disfigured.

To leave you,
Forgotten, ...I have not invested enough emotion into the tree to empathise with it. It is not familiar enough to me. I will not miss it. Its being forgotten doesn't make a difference to me. As a reader, you're losing me at this point.
Undistinguishable,..weak abstraction 
And entangled,
In a pile of sad trees. ..nice

nice idea overall. but yeah, the tree dies too soon in the poem.

Thanks for your comments! This was about taking down the Xmas tree on new years day and dragging it out of a block of flats (violently) to leave by the roadside for collection (in the UK councils collect Xmas trees and they pile up on the roadside). The maids milking refers to the 12 days of Xmas and the day the tree is disposed of even though the 12 days are not over. I think you are right about working on this so that the reader feels ready to sympathise with the tree. I guess I can expand on the connect we have with these trees we decorated, feel comforted by through the festive period and then dispose of.

---

Very clear.

I get the 'usage' of the tree. It is very easy to understand and apply this idea of usage to other components of life.  However the title of 'Sad tree' may be a little too clear, I believe that there is room for development. This tree to me is not just a sad tree, but one of many sad trees.

"In a pile of sad trees." What caused the tree to be sad? Was it sad from the beginning or was it that it only took 3 glasses of wine for Wayno's (some random character I just made up) mother in law to snarl at him causing a family fracas? Is it by design that this tree and trees before it are this way, or is it the product of some repetitive process?

Thanks for your comments, which I have addressed in some ways in the reply to the comment below. I think the tree represents all Xmas trees and all the joy and sadness they witness throughout the festive period. It's also about endings too. I think you are right about that the title could be better.

[browtm7]

Have you considered "Christmas Tree" as the title?

It may seem too obvious a title for you, but I felt like an idiot once I read your explanation of the poem. It became a clear and pictured piece once I knew what the speaker was describing. Maybe it's just me, but I needed the "Christmas" tree to hit me in the face before I could see it.

Once I knew exactly what tree this was, the poem, and especially the ending:

Undistinguishable,
And entangled,
In a pile of sad trees.

Worked beautifully for me.

Thanks for sharing it!

TB

[Achebe]

The maids milking refers to the 12 days of Xmas

Ah, that explains it. I haven't heard the full song.

[Erthona]

MAE27,

I was kind of hoping this had something to do with Shakespeare's 12th Night, but... 

Even as accentual verse only the first two stanzas work very well, the rest kind of devolves into a puddle of mush. Generally a sign of someone with little or no training in meter and trying to muscle it through by ear. Well, we've all been there. The first idea is to make each succeeding stanza mimic the first stanzas in form, at least in this sort of poem. So look at the first stanza, it starts off fairly well:

"Your sparkly baubles dangle,
Sad droopy tree,
Your star is staring down,
On a needle sea."

The only thing keeping this from being in iambic is the extra syllable in the form of the "a" in line four, which is not even needed. We'll make no mention of the half foot in L1 as it doesn't really bother much. However if you could correct that along with the extra "a". Then we would have three feet of iambs followed by two feet (an iamb is a two syllable foot consisting of an unstressed followed by a stressed syllable). da-dum

Sooo if we do a bit of an edit we have a pattern for the rest of the poem.

"Your sparkly baubles hang
sad droopy tree,
Your star is staring down,
On needle sea."

However, I like the "a"

So you could add an "and" after sad to balance it out.

"Your sparkly baubles hang,
sad and droopy tree.
Your star is staring down,
on a needle sea."

Now if you built the rest of your poem on one of these you would have a nice sort of advanced nursery rhyme in terms of form.

Here is a nice Wiki article on Common Meter that's good to start with and it's free. Some of the patterns are not dissimilar to your first stanza.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_metre

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As I've already gone to long for this forum, on content I will just observe that most of what follows S1 and S2, seems a bit ad hoc and at points nonsensical, as thought the writer were reaching blindly for words to finish the poem, having started with an idea, but running out of steam after the initial burst. Been there also.

Welcome to the site,

Best,

dale

[MAE27]

MAE27,

I was kind of hoping this had something to do with Shakespeare's 12th Night, but... 

Even as accentual verse only the first two stanzas work very well, the rest kind of devolves into a puddle of mush. Generally a sign of someone with little or no training in meter and trying to muscle it through by ear. Well, we've all been there. The first idea is to make each succeeding stanza mimic the first stanzas in form, at least in this sort of poem. So look at the first stanza, it starts off fairly well:

"Your sparkly baubles dangle,
Sad droopy tree,
Your star is staring down,
On a needle sea."

The only thing keeping this from being in iambic is the extra syllable in the form of the "a" in line four, which is not even needed. We'll make no mention of the half foot in L1 as it doesn't really bother much. However if you could correct that along with the extra "a". Then we would have three feet of iambs followed by two feet (an iamb is a two syllable foot consisting of an unstressed followed by a stressed syllable). da-dum

Sooo if we do a bit of an edit we have a pattern for the rest of the poem.

"Your sparkly baubles hang
sad droopy tree,
Your star is staring down,
On needle sea."

However, I like the "a"

So you could add an "and" after sad to balance it out.

"Your sparkly baubles hang,
sad and droopy tree.
Your star is staring down,
on a needle sea."

Now if you built the rest of your poem on one of these you would have a nice sort of advanced nursery rhyme in terms of form.

Here is a nice Wiki article on Common Meter that's good to start with and it's free. Some of the patterns are not dissimilar to your first stanza.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_metre

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As I've already gone to long for this forum, on content I will just observe that most of what follows S1 and S2, seems a bit ad hoc and at points nonsensical, as thought the writer were reaching blindly for words to finish the poem, having started with an idea, but running out of steam after the initial burst. Been there also.

Welcome to the site,

Best,

dale

Thanks for your comments Dale. I wasn't attempting to produce a poem under the normals rules of meter (which I understand somewhat). In a sense this is 'modern poetry' and for me the short lines at the end are meant to structure the poem in a way that the reader feels they are being dragged down the stairs along with the Xmas tree. More Carol Ann Duffy than Shakeapeare I guess.

It is so helpful to get all the diverse comments which are helping me to think again about my poems. Dale, you are correct, I am a play it by ear writer who likes to bash these things out. I would like to revisit and review my poems to take them too the next level.

[Erthona]

MAE27,

Ah yes, I've tried such experiments before, as here most of mine didn't usually work, but I salute you for the attempt. If you are looking to salvage this try starting the poem off by not giving the appearance of meter. You also might want to look into concrete poetry, so as to give a visual impression along with the words.

Best,

Dale