Brighton Walk.

Walking on the South Downs.

The South Downs rise and fall like a giants breath, 

endless green underfoot, endless blue overhead.

Looking down to the town, as gulls see the world, 

detached from this ideal, people are working instead. 

The rain arrives, a wakeup call, the realization

that others share this peaceful serene is a shock. 

Not just others though, but dogs as well, rushing

past like greyhounds released from their box. 

The view disappears like a blanket thrown over a cage,

an ideal invaded by boots and colourful raincoats. 

The town is hidden amidst a sea of two legs and four,

a storm of waves, engulfed by the sails of boats. 

Reviews

[Gryphgal]

Hi,
What I enjoyed was the simplicity/complexity tension. So, the images a very immediate and simple but the construction of the poem is extremely disciplined. I like the alternate capitalisation of the lines - I like it not just because it is original and clever, but because it makes perfect sense. The stanzas all incorporate two sentences spread over 4 lines, with the capitalisation occurring where it is correct to do so....but all other poems I have read just don't do that. Why? We accept boxes so easily that it is nice to see one broken - but not for a statement...just because it makes sense.

I could picture the day, the scene and even the dogs! So it worked on quite a few levels for me.

[Fae]

I really like this poem. It's a nice balance between complexity and simplicity. Really lovely! The images in it were really easy to conjure because you wrote them so well - I could picture this scene and felt like I could reconstruct it from this poem. I love the images you've chosen.

In addition, the poem doesn't feel forced. It has a nice rhythm even though you've stuck to a rhyme scheme, and this is difficult to do, imo. It showcases a careful control of your poetry, but also a great execution of your ideas.

However, the use of "ideal" was a bit jolting. Maybe add a comma after "ideal" in the fourth line to make it more obvious it's being used as a noun.