Happiness is a giant play ground
Where I do as I please
Happiness is a rollercoaster
Hair flying in the breeze
Happiness is a sparkling sea
Waves lapping at my feet
Happiness is a chocolate cake
That I always love to eat
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3 comments:
Sparkle, hello there. I'm Jonathan and I'm one of your moderators for the blog this year. Right, let's get straight onto your metaphor poem.
I think it's an absolutely lovely poem - it really made me smile to read it, which I guess is the intention. It brilliantly fulfils the task set to you, and it does so simply and straightforwardly.
Each of the four metaphors shines a different light on the subject you have chosen. They show how happiness can mean – in my reading of your poem – total personal freedom (the playground); elation, being taken out of time (the rollercoaster); peace, and a ‘one-ness’ with the world (the sea); and, quite simply, ordinary pleasure (the cake).
In terms of the language, you have chosen simple expressions, but I think that is quite right for the subject matter – true happiness is never complicated, so you should not necessarily try to write complicatedly about it.
What I most like about the imagery you use is the sense of movement, especially in lines 3 to 6. Of course, there is a sense of activity right from the start, with the giant playground. And, in fact, that adjective ‘giant’ is a great choice – some playgrounds are pretty dull, after all, but this playground is one that a child will never get bored of playing in.
But look at the movement in the second and third metaphors – hair ‘flying in the breeze’, followed by waves ‘lapping at my feet’. The first one is so exciting, the second one so calming. These are favourite lines, and, taken together, they make an excellent core to the poem.
I’m not quite so sure about the final metaphor, for two reasons. Firstly, the last line is a little clumsy, as if you are trying to fit the words into the rhythm. They don’t ‘flow’. And, secondly, the image itself is a little bit, well, greedy! As if happiness is something you can buy in a cake shop, take home and scoff. (Do you always love to eat chocolate cake? Sometimes I’d rather have an apple, or a cool glass of water, or even a sponge cake). I prefer your other versions of happiness – happiness that comes for free, through play, adventure and just ‘being in the world’.
It’s not necessarily better, but how about:
‘Life is a chocolate cake
To make and share and eat’ or ‘For me and my friends to eat’.
Are those better? Maybe not.
Three other tiny, tiny points:
i) ‘playground’ is one word.
ii) In the second line, you could put ‘can’ in – ‘Where I can do as I please’. The rhythm works fine without it, but putting it in suggests that happiness isn’t so much doing what you want, but being able to do what you want. Do you see the difference?
iii) Punctuation. There’s no harm in putting full stops at the end of lines 2,4,6 and 8, like in englishguru’s poem.
But, as I say, these are small points, and none of them take away from what is a confident, spirited and fun poem. Well done!
Not much to add to what Jonathan says, sparkle - but this really is a great poem, and a very impressive wordvoodoo debut.
I agree with what he says about the final metaphor, which is also my least favourite. I especially like the 2nd and 3rd ones, partly because of the second line of each one: "hair flying" and "waves lapping" extend each metaphor brilliantly. What you have used is something called the "present participle" - and what it does is make the reader feel like what you are describing is actually happening at the same time as we read about it. Very effective indeed.
I also like the alliteration in "sparkling sea'; I LOVE alliteration, and am a big believer that it can transform any writing into something even more special.
Well done, sparkle. You are clearly a force to be reckoned with, and wordvoodoo is obviously lucky to have you on board! :)
to Jonathan and englishguru
Thank you for your comments. I'm
glad you liked most of my poem.
I have read all your comments
and will use them to help me improve my poem for task two.
Although I still think chocalate
cake makes m happy.
from sparkle
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