This is Sonnet V. What do you think? (Finished)?

Question

Is it Iambic?

And should a sonnet be 14 lines?

Sonnet V

Her smile, the bloom of joy and mirth

Awakens in my moonless night

She is a walking star on earth

That blinds the sky and all its light

Her laughter, the sweet voice of spring

Does play in me a golden lyre

The cherubim of heaven sing

A song that stars and moon admire

And so I crave that tender kiss

That drowns me in a sea of bliss

Answer 1

Yes, it's iambic. Yes, a sonnet must be 14 lines. You need to add another stanza if you want this to be a sonnet.

As far as the poem itself: I'll give it 5/10. It's well-constructed: the rhyme and rhythm are spot on. That's already better than a lot of people can do. On the other hand, the content really feels like a bunch of cliches strung together (she outshines the sun, cherubim sing, I drown in a sea of bliss). Of course, it's hard to be original in a love sonnet, these days, so many have been written.

Answer 2

It does have to be 14 lines. The last two have to rhyme with each other.

Do you know what a system of scansion is. The most strict sonnet writers use the system to make their poetry perfectly iambic.

I use the ictus and x system.

Sonnet v

"Her smile, the bloom of joy and mirth (10) xx/x/x/x/

Awakens in my moonless night (8) xx/xxxx/

She is a walking star on earth (8) **You are supposed use ten syllables here.  and the same footing as you did in line one. This inconsistency is only seen by hardcore studiers of poetry. You can write a sonnet, that is freestyle and loose of the strict rules, and people can still read it as a sonnet.

I've written a couple of the freestyle. It's nearly impossible to perfect footing. I don't know how Shakespeare managed to do it, again and again.

Bravo, great poem. I have read poems about admiring stars, personified as women far in the skies, but never have I read one about a star on earth. Creative. Just finish this and I'm sure it will be a

9.5/10

Answer 3

This is really a curtal of sorts because it lacks a third quatrain, and it does not have quite the logical structure common to Shakespearean sonnets (partly in consequence of the missing quatrain) and of course it has only eight syllables per line, not the ten required by iambic pentameter.  And yet, the metrical flow of this poem is far better than almost anything I've read on Y!A.  You have some wonderful leakages between quatrains.  When you mention the moon, you elicit the beauty of Selene and the myth of Endymion, and the golden lyre is a lovely allusion to Orpheus and Eurydice, and causes us to reassess the moonless night of your second line.  The choice of cherubim in line seven is wonderful because of the etymological play on the Aramaic kerebya -- "like a child" --  that captures the warm rapture that connects lover and beloved.  This may not be a sonnet, but it is a lovely poem.

Permit me to try to follow in your path and write a sonnet that echoes your rich understanding:

Her smile, a tender bloom of joy and mirth,

Did beckon softly like a moonlit night,

If I could summon stars to walk on earth

They would be no more radiant in my sight.

Her laughter fell on me like showers of spring.

Her love song music from a golden lyre,

With voice more pure than seraphs on the wing,

Once knew me but forgave my base desire.

If only I could feel her tender kiss,

Could see her smile, could hear her laughter plain,

Then I would swim enrapt in seas of bliss

And I would breathe, and learn to love again.

Cruel fate that steals from me, and mocks my love,

Yet lets me live, and long, for what's above.