For Competition 3436 you were invited to submit a poem whose first line is ‘O my love is like [fill in the gap]’ and continue for up to a further 16 lines.
This Valentines challenge was an extremely popular one which drew a mammoth entry. Commendations to Pamela Haddon, Joyce Bateman and Gillian Emerson. The £25 John Lewis vouchers go to the authors of those entries printed below.
O my love is like a Wordsworth verse
In ‘Lucy’s-copped-it’ mode –
With constitution of a hearse
Upon the Grasmere road.His face is furrowed, grey and grim,
His smiles are in abatement –
To say I rarely fancy him
Would be an understatement.But though I’m half as old, he yet
Depends upon my skill –
I know by heart my alphabet
And helped concoct his will –My love’s a miser, rich in dosh –
No children, though, have we –
So when he’s in his grave, oh gosh!
The difference to me!Bill Greenwell
O my love is like a fountain pen
Unopened in its case.
I treasure it but don’t know when
To take it from its place.Perhaps, when I was seeing Jane
It could have made its mark,
Spelling her name. I thought again
And kept it in the dark.Evangeline! Now she deserved
Epistles in fine ink.
The pen stayed boxed, like me, reserved,
An error, you may think.This pen – my love – remains pristine;
Decades I’ve kept it pure.
Despite the women there have been
It writes my signature.Adrian Fry
O my love is like [fill in the gap]
Or as a luscious [simile]
My love is such a [handsome chap]
A [symbolism] such as me!
Had I command of [something great]
[Alliteration] darling dream,
I would not [adverb] pause and wait;
And yet – and yet – [the second theme]
[Poetic fancy]’s out of joint;
[Pathetic fallacy] still weeps;
My hopes decay like [counterpoint]
He [assonance] each evening keeps.
[Anaphora] no more, no more,
A hush falls on my last [enjamb-
-ment]. Fails my [metaphor].
No more [caesura]. Epigram?Frank Upton
O my Luve’s like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June;
That fragrant mulch where’er she grows
Fair causeth me tae swoon.An’ will ye aye my lover be?
Thy scent’s sae sweetly whiffy;
Tho’ wee green beasties cover thee
An’ bonie bairns do sniff ‘ee.My heart-wrung tears ne’er dinnae stop
Until I hae thee bedded,
Afore thy dewy petals drop
An’ thou art a’ dead-headed.So fare thee weel, my only Luve!
Acquaintance nae forgot
Till next year, for thou cannae move –
Tha’s rooted to the spot!David Silverman
O my love is like a distant shore,
That frames a pleasant land,
Where once I heard the breakers roar,
And walked the windswept sand;I took no ship, I fought no war,
I domiciled my heart,
But found one day that land no more
Than lines upon a chart;And though I haunt the twilight ports,
The hidden aerodromes,
There is no ticket to be bought
No ship to take me home;But now that autumn’s at my door,
The russets of this fall,
Can make it seem that I but dreamed,
And never left at allNick Syrett
O, my love is like the HS2,
the fastest girl you’ll find,
she’s fun and full of promise, though
she tends to change her mind.She said that she’d go ‘all the way’
then cut communications
but still I shall pursue my love,
ignore her machinations.Although I’ll love her ’til I die
I fear that she’s expensive,
she asks for millions, then some more,
her spending is extensive.
Some say that she makes too much noise,
prefer to keep their distance –
yet, offered transports of delight
I’ll put up no resistance.Sylvia Fairley
No. 3439: The borrowers
Literature is full of borrowings, so let’s have examples of undiscovered poems built round a phrase lifted from the work of an earlier poet. Please email entries of up to 16 lines to competition@spectator.co.uk by midday on 24 February.
Comments