Another silly Valentine

[RiverNotch]

I don't even have a Valentine. I think I'm (over)compensating.

TO MY VALENTINE

Don't be a Saint for me tonight,
my almond tree -- although the night
between our naked bodies is as death,
and beauty is as holiness,
your rosy crown is no triumphal wreath,
and even God suffers unrest.
Until love pleases, let us sleep instead,
and let the cherubs sanctify our bed.

[cidermaid]

Made me think of Song of songs, probably not what was on your mind but just thought I would mention this (specifically Sos 2 :7)

Meanwhile back at the poem...
the use of almond tree is one image too far into symbolism for most i think including this reader (and I love a good biblical symbolism fest, i've normally got more than my fair share of them shoe horned into my poetry somewhere!)

I did have a slight bump of comprehension between the don't be a saint for me opener and then the let us sleep instead, felt like a reversal of intent, but then it leaves the reader open to put their own slant of ideas in here...complete with all the corruptions that can be expected on a poetry site, so perhaps this is a good thing as it opens the read up to a wider audience.
but the rest of it I quite enjoy and think it works well.
All the best AJ.

[RiverNotch]

Two notes:
Until love pleases was me quoting SoS, yuss (though I forget which version) -- the book was also the reason for line 6.

Almond tree: I looked up the life of Saint Valentine, and apparently his Julia planted a pink-blossomed almond tree in his honor after he lost his noodle to Emperor Claudius -- but it probably means something else.

[Erthona]

Quotation marks are for those times that you quote. Please revise and enclose any material in quotation marks that has been quoted or paraphrased. If it is a long or significant section please footnote. I'm sure just an oversight.

Thank you,

dale/mod

[billy]

an 8 eight liner may be a short poem
but it's a tad longer than what's expected in the short form threads. [you can post such in the for fun forum or any of the other forums] thanks.

please don't be offended; the poem for me seems to be trying to be too hall mark. [cheesy] the beauty is as holiness killed me.

I don't even have a Valentine. I think I'm (over)compensating.

TO MY VALENTINE

Don't be a Saint for me tonight,
my almond tree -- although the night
between our naked bodies is as death,
and beauty is as holiness,
your rosy crown is no triumphal wreath,
and even God suffers unrest.
Until love pleases, let us sleep instead,
and let the cherubs sanctify our bed.

[RiverNotch]

billy: it's too long? dang, sorry -- can this whole thing be moved to misc, instead? as for the cheese, i'm a bit indifferent, actually, since i recognized this was mozzarella the moment i started writing this, though i didn't expect that specific line to have killed it (for me, the main marker was the end couplet). and at least it's not so cheesy to have a message too irredeemable -- though i don't expect to make this any more, er, memorable any time soon.

dale: do i really have to put it in quote marks? it's a slightly paraphrased fragment ("Until love pleases") of a verse (SoS 8:4) from an uncopyrghted translation (just remembered, both ASV and KJV, which read the same) of one of the oldest holy-libraries in the world, and putting it in quote marks or italics would make the message more, er, muddled, for me.

[billy]

lets just leave it here as a reminder to others

[Erthona]

I don't know, is it your original work? If you are using someone else's original work (whether it is copyrighted is beside the point, that only comes into play when suing over plagiarized work, which can only happen on pieces since copyrighted material has become standardized in the legal system), you should acknowledge it and not pretend it is your own, simply to avoid being deceitful. Should you need more reasons, passing off someone else's work as your own in the literary world is at the top of the no-no list. I have seen people lose their jobs in academia for such violations. It goes to trust. While I'm sure you did not mean to be lifting, or did not feel as though you were using someone else's work as your own and you did acknowledge it in your note, it does however begin to breed distrust of a writer if people feel they play fast and loose with material that is not their own. So yes, if you use material that is someone else's, even non-published material, it should be put in quote marks, so that there is no doubt that you are not trying to pass off someone else's work as your own.  
If the quote or paraphrase is widely known, say "You must be born again", then there needs no footnote. However, if the quote is not widely known, then a footnote is needed to identify where that quote came from. If I quote the line "Corporeal Friends are Spiritual Enemies" I would need to note it is from William Blake's poem "Milton" in the first book. This would be considered an adequate note for such a quote within a poem. In writing a literary paper governed by the MLA standards, it is much stricter.
By giving the reader the note it does 2 things, it acknowledges whose quote it is and it allows the reader enough information if they wish to go to the source for a greater understanding of why it was quoted, or simply because they are intrigued and wish to expand their knowledge in that area.    
One last and very simple reason is in the name of the marks themselves, "quotation marks", that is these are to be used around anything that is a quote. Therefore, anything that is not the original material of the writer of the poem needs quotation marks around it.

Hope that helps,

dale

[Achebe]

we've recently had a log thread discussing this.
Allusion is different from plagiarism, and footnoting or quoting  allusions defeats the purpose. Why allude at all of the idea is to make it obvious? Why not annotate every line of a poem then?
One may choose to do it, but it should not be enforced as a rule.
The Waste Land is 60% allusions, for instance.

The difference between an academic paper and a poem is that in the former, allusion serves no purpose. In a poem, on the other hand, allusion serves the definite purpose of enriching emotional content, by slightly opening the door to a shared consciousness. The moment you italicise or put within quotes such allusion, it stands out uncomfortably from the body of the poem.
Take, for instance:

The barge she sat in, like a burnish’d throne,
Burned on the water...
 ------ Antony and Cleopatra

The Chair she sat in, like a burnished throne,
Glowed on the marble...
---A Game of Chess (The Waste Land)

That stray reference to Antony and Cleopatra conjures up a world of images, of opulent luxury, not just of Cleopatra's barge, but of the particularly rich poetry of the play itself. There are several conscious and subconscious associations that result from this.
This is allusion without direct repetition. There are also examples of the other kind in Eliot. 
For instance, from 'The Fire Sermon' in the Waste Land:

Sweet Thames, run softly, till I end my song (Spenser, Prothalamion)

Musing upon the king my brother's wreck
And on the king my father's death before him. (Shakespeare, The Tempest)

The decision on whether or not an example of allusion is plagiarism should be taken by the mod on a case by case basis, I would argue. One useful thing about allusion is that it can work only for 2-3 lines. Anything going over that limit is more likely to be a direct rip off. So it isn't that difficult to spot.

Note to mod: please move this post to the Discussion forum if you feel that is where it belongs.

[RiverNotch]

hmm...I think the "quote" would be better characterized as an "allusion", yeah. bigger hmm....