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Longing
Posted: 11 June 2008
Word Count: 44
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So I’m worrying again
about how the story ends.
I always see the dress
but not much else,
only to long for your stare,
I love being there.
If only I could be
how I wanted
all the time.
How I long.
I long.
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Comments by other Members
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 joanie at 21:49 on 12 June 2008
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Stephen, you always write with such feeling. ' I long' resonates with most of us here, I' m sure!
joanie
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 Tina at 18:14 on 13 June 2008
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HI Stephen
This is an interesting piece - with some enigmatic ideas.
I like the opening two lines - they draw me into your story quickly and effectively but then I am not sure how lines 3-5 relate to those that follow - I am sorry to be a bit dense - can you enlighten me about what you mean here?
In lines 6&8 you have these heavily rhymed endstopped lines which rather weigh the poem down when its whole tenure is rather soft and tender. I wonder if you could make use of the word long and its different meanings - how long have I longed???
It certainly coveys the meaning and feeling of longing and need to be held and understood.
Tina
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 James Graham at 20:33 on 14 June 2008
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Hi Stephen - good to have a new poem from you. It’s one that I’ve been puzzling over, feeling that it needs reworking but not sure in what way.
‘I long’ is clearly the most emphatic and telling line. It’s a deliberately unfinished sentence, which readers could finish in countless different ways. The response it calls for is, ‘Oh yes, I long too...for love, for peace of mind, for experience’...etc. What the line does is universalise the personal longing you express in the rest of the poem. The impression of the whole poem is that it’s predominantly a universal lyrical poem about longing.
But at the same time it seems to focus strongly on the woman who is addressed in
I always see the dress
but not much else,
only to long for your caress |
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- and the reason it focuses so strongly on this is (1) the heavy rhyme, and (2) the position of these lines in the poem, just before the end. As a result the poem seems to be a poem of longing for love only - a narrower, more particular longing. Yet at the same time it is trying to be more universal than that. It seems not to know which way it' s going, particular or universal.
I’m not saying the love lines have no place in the poem - but perhaps their place should be a little further away from the strong ending. How do you feel about this change?
So I’m worrying again
about how the story ends.
I always see the dress
but not much else,
only to long for your caress.
If only I could be
how I wanted
all the time.
How I long.
I long. |
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It’s hard to explain, but I feel that the more universal emphasis comes over better like this.
I think you should get rid of the rhyme too. Just replace ‘caress’ with another word. Then the lines would speak to us in a quieter voice. And I think the line ‘but not much else’ is a bit weak and could be left out. All this would retain the love-longing part of the poem but put more weight on the theme of universal longing.
I hope you can make sense of all this. I mused over this poem for quite a while, feeling something was not quite right but not sure what it was. I may still be wrong. Let me know what you think.
James.
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hailfabio at 15:08 on 16 June 2008
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Thanks for taking time to look at this, yes it needs re-jigging a bit. I think the rhyme is a bit too much.
Thanks
Stephen
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James Graham at 21:03 on 16 June 2008
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Hi Stephen - yes, I do think the new order of the lines works better. The rhyme is less heavy now, but I still wonder if it could do without rhyme altogether. You made these lines
only to long for your stare,
I love being there |
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a little awkward by rhyming ' stare' with ' there' . It' s a perfect rhyme of course, but ' stare' does suggest a cold or even hostile look. Not really an affectionate look. If you forget about rhyming, you have a much wider choice of words.
But as I said, I think this order of the ideas in the poem gives it the right balance.
James.
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