like a rose

The love between damon ( a poor boy) and june( the royal princess) is unconditional and endless but things never remain the same. As damon see's his lover being taken to the royal graveyard he cant do anything but beg them for one last look. He then recites his story of their love. where as june's soul tries to tell him that no matter how far they are now, they can never be apart.

Like a Rose 

Damon "
I’m inside, these high held walls.
With no mark of light, away from your sight.
Behind the stones, your palace they see.
But nobody is there, to answer my calls.

Me was nothing, more than a helot.
Of this town of Sparta, of which you were my lord.
The princess, the beauty.

Away from their vision, You became my obsession.
And I became your drug, Who used to be a thug.

You asked me for nothing, But gave me a lot .
Stood by me, with all your pride.
Even at the day, when we were caught.
You cried, I screamed. They out-shined our dream,
Of staying together. Till our death, forever.

Between the stars, like a moon.
Is my love, for you June.

The tears are gone, But no smile I see.
Maybe its you. Or just the passing fleet.
There are kings and queens,
Monarchs and knights.
Between them, I see you sleeping.
Silently, in the quite.

Your soulless figure, Seems dead to the crowd.
But I see you smiling, secretly I doubt.

With roses of red, they high held your bed.
Making their way, to the ancestral grave.
Breaking the silence, their moan I hear.
Wish I could see you, for the last time oh dear.

The wind has gone, along with the heat.
Feels like you are no more here, or as if I cant breathe.
Take me my soul away from here, I won’t cry I swear.
Just let me be one of the roses, covering the grave of my dear.

June-
With the flowery leaves,
I am taking my leave, from here my love.
Above you cry and weep,
To be a rose, on my berth.

But they are dim and vain,
Cannot feel, the budding pain.
Inside your warm and my numb nerves.
You are so far, behind the bars
And I am here, below the mud.

Still you hear, the sound of my smile.
Without the ply, of any words.
You were my passion, my desire for life.
You were my Damon, in this harsh life.

My tears are gone, as I am in peace.
I still hear you moaning, I wish I could seize.
Your pain, your wounds with love and heat.

Have strength my love, for the life ahead.
They may not let you, see my bed.

But I will stay, in your arms.
Like roses are, coated with red.
Behind the walls, no palace you see.
Never was it, there for me.

My world is you, no matter how far,
They keep me from you.
I'll always stay your moon, around the stars.
- Kirty Labra

Reviews

[Nigel Newman]

Kirty Hi. You sent a read request. I'm happy to review it but from a quick skim it looks as though this is based at least partially on a historical event or time. It might help if you could add an author's note to provide a little background. Cheers, Nigel

[Kirty labra]

sure :) i'll do that soon

[Nigel Newman]

OK your intro helps, and I also found out that helots were Spartan slaves - that was completely new to me! I love the sense or essence of the poem. You may be interested to listen to 'Oh Danny Boy', which has very similar sentiments. There are several versions on YouTube - here are the words:

Oh Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling
From glen to glen, and down the mountain side
The summer's gone, and all the roses falling
It's you, it's you must go and I must bide.

But come ye back when summer's in the meadow
Or when the valley's hushed and white with snow
It's I'll be here in sunshine or in shadow
Oh Danny boy, oh Danny boy, I love you so.

But when ye come, and all the flowers are dying
If I am dead, as dead I well may be
Ye'll come and find the place where I am lying
And kneel and say an ave there for me.

And I shall hear, though soft you tread above me
And all my grave will warmer, sweeter be
For you will bend and tell me that you love me
And I shall sleep in peace until you come to me.

Though I like the heart in your poem I think there are grammatical things that get in the way of the reader's enjoyment. I think there are a number of spelling and punctuation errors, and the easiest way for me to respond is actually to semi-rewrite your poem with my rationale. I'd be happy to do that if it would help. Please let me know.

[Kirty labra]

thanks for the review and i would surely like your addition

[Nigel Newman]

Kirty this is my review, if you will, and it takes the form of suggested rewrites. The poem is obviously recognisably still yours, but I found that, in order to address something I wished to raise, I sometimes had to re-write part of the poem.

My instinct is that I have possibly gone too far, so please forgive me, and obviously feel free to completely disregard, reject, etc any suggestions I’ve made. Again, I have only done this because the poem seems to me to have great potential - well worth working on!

I also comment below that I’ve found a few of your wordings or rhymes a bit clunky, and have re-written the passage they sit within to try and form something that flows better. Where I have done this, by all means reject my suggestions, but please at least take another look in your own way at the passages in question.


[Damon]

(1) I’m inside these high held walls
With no mark of light
Away from your sight
Behind the stones
Your palace I see
But no-one is there to answer my calls


(2) I was nothing more than a helot of this town of Sparta
Of which you were my lord; the princess; the beauty
Away from their vision
You became my obsession
I, once a thug, became your drug


(3) You asked me for nothing
But gave me a lot
Stood by me, with all your pride
Even on the day we were caught
You cried
I screamed
We. Denied our dream
Of staying together, till our death, forever


(4) Outshining the stars lies the moon
It is my love for you, my June


(5) The tears are gone but no smile I see
Maybe it’s you, or just the passing fleet
There are kings and queens
A monarch, a knight
I see you sleeping between them
Silently in the quiet


(6) Your soul-less figure seems dead to the crowd
But I hear you smiling and singing aloud


(7) With roses of red, they high held your bed
Making their way to the ancestral grave
Breaking the silence. Their moan I hear
Oh would I could see you one last time, my dear


(8) The wind has gone along with the heat
Like you’re no longer here; As if I can’t breathe
Mayhap they’ll drag me away from your grave
And yet I won’t cry, I swear
I will be one of the roses
Wafting sweet scents through your hair



[June]

(9) With the flowery leaves
I am taking my leave from here my love
Above you cry and weep
To be a rose in my earth


(10) But they are dim and vain
And cannot bridge the budding pain
Of my cold bed, nought to be found
You growing far beyond the bars
WhileI am here beneath the ground


(11) Still you hear the sound of my smile
Without the ply of any words
You were my passion, my desire unfurled
You were my Damon in this harsh world


(12) My tears are gone
I am in peace
I still hear you moaning
I wish I could cease
Your pain
Your wounds
With love and heat


(13) They may not let you see my bed
Have strength, my love, for the life ahead
But I will stay in your arms
Like roses are, coated with red


(14) Behind the walls; no palace you see
Never was it there for me.
My world is you
No matter how far
They keep me from you
I'll always be your moon
Outshining every star




Note 1: Only significant change is no-one instead of nobody. It just seems to scan better.

Note 2: I’ve combined these two short verses. I also changed a ‘Me’ to ‘I’. More significantly I changed the thug line, which to me sounded a bit clunky as it stood. The thug part is now earlier in the line, and with less words.

Note 3: My main change is to use ‘Denied’ (as in we were denied the opportunity ….) rather than out-shine. I thought out-shine went against the meaning you were trying to convey. Also, I soon realised I wanted to use it elsewhere (see 4 below).

Note 4: I think you should convey the sense that somehow the moon is the important thing rather than the stars, so I have suggested ‘outshine’

Note 5: Nothing major here but I changed it so that ‘knight’ could be singular to rhyme better with quiet (I assume you meant quiet not quite)

Note 6: I don’t think Damon doubts, so I have suggested him hearing June in his head

Note 7: I’ve tweaked the last line a bit. I think it reads better.

Note 8: Some quite big suggested changes here and I may have misinterpreted what you wanted to say. The ‘take me my soul away’ part seemed odd to me. I imagine Damon would be thinking ‘they may physically pull me away but in my heart and soul I will always be here’, so that’s what I suggest you should try to convey. I don’t think you should use ‘dear’ again as it appeared in the previous verse, so hence the suggested ‘hair’ rhyme. However, I rather liked your ‘covering the grave’ part, but couldn’t find a way to use that part and still avoid the ‘dear’.

Note 9: I’m suggesting a change from ‘berth’ to ‘earth’ because it just seemed a strange word to use. I suppose a berth is what one has on a cruise ship, so maybe she is on a journey … Not sure?

Note 10: I wasn’t 100% sure who ‘they’ were/are. I assumed they were general people, but you could mean the roses, the palace guard, the royal family? I’ve assumed it’s some sort of people. I spent quite a while on lines 3, 4 and 5. I interpreted your ‘Inside your warm’ as “you are warm”; whereas June is feeling nothing because her nerves are numb. The distance between them in physical terms is from ‘behind the bars’ to ‘below the mud’. I’ve tried to suggest a rhyme with at least partial meter to convey this. I struggled - I don’t think it flows well, but see what you think.

Note 11: I wasn’t keen on the rhyme of ‘life’ with ‘life’ so I’ve suggested an alternative.

Note 12: I assume you meant ‘cease’ rather than ‘seize’?

Note 13: I suggest it sounds better to switch the first and second lines of this verse.

Note 14: I think you could improve the very last clause. Perhaps ‘amid’ (or among) the stars? I also tried ‘outshining the stars’. I think all are better than ‘around’ because a moon doesn’t exist ‘around’ stars - they surround it rather than it surrounding them. I think this clause is quite important because it’s the take-away idea. If you went with my ‘outshining’ suggestion, this might imply that Damon will forever see and think of June as the best thing that could ever have happened for him. The remainder of his life is therefore a sort of torment until he hopes to one day find peace beside her. Alternatively if you used ‘amid’ or ‘among’ these words suggest more of a harmony between the moon and the surrounding stars, and thus the possibility for Damon that eventually he may find at least some comfort in life.

[Nigel Newman]

Kirty just so you know - the deleted postings were me! I'd written my comments in Mac Pages and pasted them across but they didn't show paragraphs, new lines etc in the way I wanted. It took me 3 goes! It's virtually there now!

[Kirty labra]

See i really appriciate your interest in my poem and i have liked some lines that you have introduced but when we arw writting a poem its all bout using different words which grammatically may appear incorrect but a poet can make them appear like thay do. For eg birth can also be used for a bed and here her bed is her grave now and when damon say take me my soul. It simply means that take his body and even his soul he wont say anything exchange as his body and his soul's presences doesnt even matter to him anymore, he just wants to be a rose covering the grave of his love. And outshined our dream is that they have destroyed their idea of staying togther. You have projected a very beautiful version of my poem but what i use is poetic license in my poem which allows me to freely use such words without offensing grammer :)

[Nigel Newman]

Kirty Hi. As I said when I sent the review, I fear I may have gone too far. You have very politely put me in my place! Poetic license is great. And anyone writing a poem has to reach their own judgement about how oblique, lateral, metaphorical, etc some wording and grammar can be vs it being more obvious and strictly grammatical, with the possible loss of flow, lyricism, ambience, etc etc that being more obvious and grammatical may carry. It's your call. It remains a lovely poem! Regards, Nigel

[Kirty labra]

I always learn from you and i am just an immature poet so you havent offended me in any way :) thankyou for takimg out time for reading my poem amd shari g your review on it

[Nigel Newman]

No it's absolutely fine. My trouble is it's so tempting to write what I think would work better for me. I say it's to improve the poem or story (implying 'for everyone'), but that is incredibly presumptuous. This happens with several writers, and I must better try to discipline myself and stay on the right side of the line. The first time I reviewed a story was for a colleague writing a chick-lit (just my thing ...?) and she specifically wanted re-drafting suggestions, e.g. how better to phrase something, whether a particular description worked, and if not then a possible improvement, etc. But her work was positioned as DRAFT. Conversely, if a writer puts something up on WC I should assume they have already done a rigorous check and have decided that any remaining spelling errors, styles of descriptions, punctuations etc are part of the FINAL product and thus deliberately intended. I shall probably still get this balance wrong sometimes in future reviews, but I am aware of my tendency, and your comments are spot on.

[Kirty labra]

Well all the best for the future ahead and i am working on a shot story la madame you will find it in my works, i would be glad if you could give it a read ever in future i would be delighted and seriously i dont mind your versions and point of view for my writtings, i belive in learning and taking in the knowledge and views given by others and i guess we all shoud have heart and hunger.

[Emily]

I really like it!!
Keep on writing!

[Kirty labra]

thanks :) and i will