Poem that I wrote one night

[Music_Is_My_Life]

This is my first time posting something I wrote but I want to know what others here think. I wrote this at around three in the morning and upon further review in the morning I'm not quite so sure about it. That said, here it is:


A tree once stood near moonlit pool
By singing brook clear and cool
That long did grow tall and fair
With a crown of stars amid leafy hair

For uncounted years it nobly stood
An ancient king of a wayward wood
West wind stirred its whispering song
Beneath the stars in shadows long

Alas for all that must sadly end
For man that tree from earth did rend
Heedless in his boundless greed
His only thoughts of fire to feed

Now the king is silent his crown is spilled
And forevermore his voice is stilled
Only the brook yet mourns his passing
In sorrowful song everlasting



Opinions? Ideas? Suggestions?
Any input would be helpful guys and I'm open to constructive criticism.

[Music_Is_My_Life]

Hmm. Lotsa looks no comments. Perhaps I wasn't assertive enough. Oh well, live and learn they say.

P.S. If someone could crit this I would greatly appreciate it.

[deathscreamingsheep]

This style of writing is not really to my taste to be honest (if you look at my most recent song you'll see why) but I'll crit it anyway.

You've obviously attempted to emulate a more old fashioned style of writing as it's quite romantic (e.g. the romantic period) and lyrical. The flow to me is fine and the imagery is alright.

However, I have a few problems. Firstly you're writing in a romantic style, but there is no real subtext- nothing you can really read into the poem. It's a bit too narrative, "The tree grew up beautiful and then it was cut down by men".

I did like the final stanza, seemed pretty nice however, the first stanza especially was a little too "seen it before" for me.

It's not bad though at any rate.

Could you crit my current song. It's under a thread entitle Random Experiment (though that isn't the title of the song).

[VUbaru]

In terms of poetry, this is not a bad first try at all. If you've been writing poetry for awhile, you might want to experiment a little bit more. Generally speaking, the rhyme scheme does not help this piece. Some rhymes are forced and seem out of place ("fair" and "hair", I really don't see "hair" fitting in the first stanza). Lines are occasionally organized in a confusing manner, for example "Now the king is silent his crown is spilled." For old-style writing such as this, you might be better off trying to write in iambic pentameter and doing a sonnet. Have you read any Robert Frost?

Some of the imagery is pretty decent, so you have some things to be proud of here. I liked how the stream "mourned" the death of the tree. Aside from the first line that I mentioned earlier, the last stanza is by far the strongest here.

For revision, I would recommend mixing up the rhyme scheme if you're more into free verse, or transforming it into a sonnet.

[Music_Is_My_Life]

Well you've given me some things to think about anyway. I kinda like the idea of this as a sonnet. And yes I was going for an old fashioned sort of mood for this piece, a "Tolkienian" feeling, so to speak. Personally I didn't like the first stanza much anyway as it felt forced to me when I wrote it (keep in mind this was at 3 in the morning, lol). Thanks for the feedback guys.

[VUbaru]

Tolken-esque :p

[Music_Is_My_Life]

Was gonna say that but couldn't remember if it was hyphenated or not, lol.

[DeadReligion]

A tree once stood near moonlit pool
By singing brook clear and cool
That long did grow tall and fair
With a crown of stars amid leafy hair
^ I should probably kill you for the terrible rhyming, however, I'm too tired, and well, its a good verse, aside from the rhyming.

For uncounted years it nobly stood
An ancient king of a wayward wood
West wind stirred its whispering song
Beneath the stars in shadows long
^ The word organization of the first line, is a bit odd to me, and the last as well, aside from that and the rhyming, this is good.

Alas for all that must sadly end
For man that tree from earth did rend
Heedless in his boundless greed
His only thoughts of fire to feed
^ The word organization of line two, is terrible, because it was formed that way, for one purpose: rhyme. That's why I don't rhyme, I find it too restraining. This all goes for the last line too. I liked the second line, though, and the last, just bad organization. The only line that wasn't great was the first, it wasn't bad, but the rest were better.

Now the king is silent his crown is spilled
And forevermore his voice is stilled
Only the brook yet mourns his passing
In sorrowful song everlasting
The first line and the third, are brilliant. The second and fourth, are a tiny bit bland, and badly organized, so they rhyme...

Overall, 8/10. This is good, especially for someone so new here.

Can you crit my new song, I'll be posting it very shortly.

[Music_Is_My_Life]

Dead Religion, I agree with your comments completely. I'm currently working on a free verse variation on this and I'll probably post it sometime soon.