A Black Hole
By Drogo
Who needs a scope to see the dark-
ness deep within my soul?
I simply need to be alone
to see there's a hole.
This hole of seeming emptiness
Yet pulls with all its might,
And seems to take in anything
Except for any light.
When the light does burn it bright
The darkness does rebel.
Why then do I still long for it
That makes my life hell?
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2 comments:
Not too sketchy a sketch, Drogo. A few observations:
The first thing I look at, for better or worse, is scansion. I'm seeing ballad quatrains with the requisite alteration between iambic tetrameter and trimeter here. However, the last lines of the first and third stanzas break from the expected trimeter (the only other metrical exception being the headless iamb, "When..." at the first line of the last stanza).
My next thought: is there a reason for these anomalies embedded in the poem? Ah yes, I answer, they create a symbolic void, an emptiness in these two lines--through the missing beats.
These two "imperfect" lines fall in the same relative place in their stanzas--a pattern, seemingly--and thus, the problem arises: why is the middle quatrain exempt from these exceptions, alone in its perfection? It might be that the first mention of light fills this metrical void...
Let there be light, if it scans well.
My only other question relates to the use of the auxiliary verbs, "does/do," in the last stanza. You conspicuously avoid superfluity in the first two stanzas, yet this final volley of helping verbs strikes me (at least at first) as gratuitous. Perhaps because they emphasize the eternal activity of this internal struggle? Can you mercilessly cut off these auxiliaries and still preserve the integrity of your expression of authorial intent?
I've spent enough keystrokes for one evening, so I won't touch the dangling suffix at line 2... Chaos expressed?
Thanks for a thoughtful sketch, Drogo. I enjoyed this poem and look forward to its future incarnations...
I'll post one of my own sketches soon for your merciless revenge...
D-mos
Points well delivered and well received. I'll re-post soon.
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