deepundergroundpoetry.com
Arthur's Day Off
He had a dream where he could see
The lunar orb as it arose
Through the shimmering of the sea
With sirens singing..."there she blows"!
It came up fast, like Aquaman,
In stellar spectrum just as gold
As lightspeed through its evening span
Of solar system constant cold.
All would steep in aquamarine
And a tropic turquoise hue
In playful blend of seaweed green
And Captain Ahab's bottle blue!
Then on a rock the sirens sang
A paean to Atlantic kings
Who stand and watch the moonrise hang
Above all oceanic things!
And long he looked and long he thought
About the water and the sky
And how he was a puny dot...
Though nicer than old Captain Bligh!
Twas then he went back to his bed...
To dream...and perchance to sleep...
But not as much as all the dead
That Davy Jones has down and deep!
The lunar orb as it arose
Through the shimmering of the sea
With sirens singing..."there she blows"!
It came up fast, like Aquaman,
In stellar spectrum just as gold
As lightspeed through its evening span
Of solar system constant cold.
All would steep in aquamarine
And a tropic turquoise hue
In playful blend of seaweed green
And Captain Ahab's bottle blue!
Then on a rock the sirens sang
A paean to Atlantic kings
Who stand and watch the moonrise hang
Above all oceanic things!
And long he looked and long he thought
About the water and the sky
And how he was a puny dot...
Though nicer than old Captain Bligh!
Twas then he went back to his bed...
To dream...and perchance to sleep...
But not as much as all the dead
That Davy Jones has down and deep!
Published 13th Sep 2023
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The author encourages honest critique.
13th Sep 2023 3:46am
13th Sep 2023 11:55am
Dreamy indeed. I felt like I was reading an old verse from a bygone poetry anthology. Something needs to be done about this line, however:
To dream, and perchance to get some sleep,
Too many syllables by one. My initial thought was lose the "get some"; however, that would bring it up one short. I have no suggestions; I need to think about it. But I love the poem as a whole.
Edit: you could lose the "to". . .when read aloud it creates some lovely consonance!
To dream, and perchance to get some sleep,
Too many syllables by one. My initial thought was lose the "get some"; however, that would bring it up one short. I have no suggestions; I need to think about it. But I love the poem as a whole.
Edit: you could lose the "to". . .when read aloud it creates some lovely consonance!
Yeah, I think I will shorten up that line, even if I have to be one syllable shy of a perfect count. I'll play around with it, but I want to preserve the Shakespearean referentiality of the sleep/dream inversion alluding to Hamlet's famous act 3, scene 1 soliloquy, and that will read as..."To dream, perchance to sleep", instead of the original..."To sleep, perchance to dream".
It's a syllable short, or two, but a better homage to the Bard that way, without being totally plagiaristic.
It's a syllable short, or two, but a better homage to the Bard that way, without being totally plagiaristic.
13th Sep 2023 7:54pm
I liked how you had it, just not the syllable count. It tripped me up when reading.
It's not plagiarism if you credit the poet. I am sure there is nothing they like better than for their work to be referred to. That's why I do it at times - to show they're not forgotten.
It's not plagiarism if you credit the poet. I am sure there is nothing they like better than for their work to be referred to. That's why I do it at times - to show they're not forgotten.
