This Poem was Submitted By: Erzahl Leo M. Espino On Date: 2004-11-29 20:24:55 . . . Click Here To Mail this Poem to a Friend!

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verse 66 (Stars)

Sparkling mistresses Attempting to steal the vow As moon weds the night

Copyright © November 2004 Erzahl Leo M. Espino


This Poem was Critiqued By: Dellena Rovito On Date: 2004-12-06 20:21:34
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 9.82051
Erzah, I got this one easy...... wonderful! The moon does wed the night. The stars try to steal also the attention.' Very nice imagery, you may be more right than you know! most enjoyable. Thanks for that viewpoint. Dellena


This Poem was Critiqued By: Wanda S. Thibodeaux On Date: 2004-12-03 21:08:49
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 10.00000
Dear Erzahl, This is great descriptive writing. I love the idea of the moon wedding the night. Tell the truth now, it takes as long to write Haiku as a much longer poem. I have some neat thoughts on this but trying to condense them into three lines must be beyond my capabilities. Here's one for you...my small grandson had a hard time saying sunshine and thunder. He loves rainy weather just like I do. He makes us laugh so often giving his interpretation of the weatherman on TV. Shunshine and Tunder Met on a hot Summer day Weatherman at four I am not a Haiku-ess. You have all the power there. Yours are always special, always correct, always winners! This is a special one. Thanks so much for this great piece. Good luck and my best wishes always, Wanda
This Poem was Critiqued By: Turner Lee Williams On Date: 2004-11-30 14:50:51
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 10.00000
Erzahl--The poem goes beyond mere personification: this is a hyperbolic piece providing vivid imagery which tickles the imagination. With the posting of each additional Japanese Verse, you manage to raise the bar a little higher. We at TPL are the willing audience to your creative genius in this genre. Thanks for including us in your flights of fancy. TLW
This Poem was Critiqued By: marilyn terwilleger On Date: 2004-11-30 12:26:03
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 9.93548
Hi Erzahl, You have managed to load this haiku with mystery and seduction...how do you do that in three lines? I just adore the notion that sparkling stars are mistress who limn the heavens with their beauty and aspire to bond with the moon. I don't know how you come up with these ideas but your haikus are masterful. This one is so playful and allows me to imagine the night, stars, and moon in another demension. The stars attempting to steal the vow between the moon and the night is delicious. One wonders what early man thought when he looked sky-ward and experienced awe of the heavens that we take as the ordinary when it is really profound and reverent. But alas the stars are spurned by the moon as she weds the night. This is so delightful and I just keep reading it and now am beginning to view the heavens as if it were mortal as it experiences the sadness of a love triangle! I hope you don't mind my digging into your lines and making them my own! I must confess that it gives me great pleasure to do so. I hope I have not gone out on a tangent and completely fractured your intention here but I must tell you how your words effect me...I enjoyed this haiku greatly...don't ever stop writing! Peace...Marilyn
This Poem was Critiqued By: Tony P Spicuglia On Date: 2004-11-30 10:00:24
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 9.96552
Hi, I do like the haiku, written with background imagery, it is as close to patterned free verse as any form can be. When we speak of mistress’s or paramours, but the feminine definitely embodies the stars and moon. “Sparkling” I can envision the stars, as I have since I was a young boy, those magical lovers of my soul. Great imagery in this line. It is of note that you used “mistresses”, rather than “lovers” or similar. A mistress portends the need for a wife, and so in a real sense one is “cheating” on somebody by absorbing the beauty of the stars. So goes your next lines. “Attempting to steal the vow” – A vow, the marriage sealer, and the stars, whose brightness like diamonds are “attempting”. This of course means the result is still in doubt, but there is a “marriage in doubt” as long as the “attempting” does not become “vain attempts”. A universal struggle, anthropomorphic transportation of the sky’s into the soul of mankind. A metaphor, if you will, on the struggle between beauties, and also the value of both the “old love” and the “new love”. “As moon weds the night”, here you reinforced “attempting”. The marriage has been in progress for a long period of time, and yet is not consummated. The stars, in their lesser brilliance but greater beauty, have a chance. This conflict is in progress, with the moon winning the battle, for now. (Oddly, the moon covered the sky a billion years ago, and has been slowly slipping away ever since. There will come a day the moon will leave, it is inevitable as the attraction of gravity weakens). I guess, the stars are fated in this struggle to win. … or will the night ever grieve for it’s lost moon, and the stars be unable to comfort.. a fine piece. Thanks for letting me read it.
This Poem was Critiqued By: James Edward Schanne On Date: 2004-11-30 09:16:20
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 9.52174
Line wine makes me think of champaigne, I see the bubbles leaving an open bottle and floating into the air especially when followed by line two - what better way to steal a vow. But it makes me wonder how they feel about the moons nuptials . sounds like their jealous. Thanks for letting me read and comment.
This Poem was Critiqued By: Joanne M Uppendahl On Date: 2004-11-29 22:18:00
Critiquer Rating During Critique: 10.00000
Erzahl: How exquisite this is - and how elegantly you have employed this difficult form. You offer a piece of experience, your perception, as a gift. It does something to this reader, to contemplate the actions of the stars, moon and night as personae. Astronomy and poetry 'wed' as the moon attempts to "wed the night" with your artistic creativity par excellence. It seems so apropos that the "moon weds the night" as the lunar light has also been known as 'queen of the night' in mythology. The moon as the planet that we are closest to (except for the one whose surface we inhabit) is our most intimate companion. For many centuries, we have looked closely at the face of the moon, with our own eyes and later, instruments. This planet gives us our tides, and some believe that it affects the growth of plants and the emotions of humans. I love the light-hearted touch of the stars "attempting to steal the vow" from the moon. The vast distances of the stars and their role of "sparkling mistresses" gives me a sense of delight, romance, and intrigue. "Night" seems a planetary phenomenon, as we experience night because of the rotation of earth away from our source of light, the sun. But -- aha! -- I realized, that of course space itself is 'night' as it is vast and dark except in the vicinity of stars. The countless legends and various beliefs about the so-called fixed stars (fixed only because of relative slowness in motion compared to our 'place in space' if you will, and our experience of time. That the "moon weds the night" seems so apt, as the moon is without its own light, of a substance that is not luminous. The moon is always 'night' on one side - facing away from us - mysteriously and forever. Magnificently done! Bravo!! All my best, Joanne
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