Crimson Kid email

The writing style (Petrarchchan sonnet) is interesting, it's used to conclude with a pretty simple message--that confinement indoors is considered by the narrator to be a worse punishment than the spanking he/she is about to endure. That's not to say that the OTK chastisement is going to be any "picnic in the park," the narrator appears to be sincerely dreading it and even refers to it (with quite a bit of hyperbole) as "sharper than the Sun - as sharp as steel," although I'd expect that "hotter" would work better than "sharper" in describing the sun--and "hot" is at least as descriptive of a spanking as "sharp" is.

For such a short poem, there are two basic overlapping emotions--comparing a place of pastoral peace and enjoyment with looming painful discipline, but then stating that the corporal punishment won't be as hurtful as the apparent "indoor grounding" away from that place--and I can't quite be certain which feeling is the main one the author is trying to convey. Perhaps that uncertainty is the main point, but I'm also uncertain of that.

Kris email

You've done a good job of catching that subjective, personal feel of place required for poetry. I'm not sure the simile of "sharp as steel" works. That implies a blade: blades are typically swords, swords are tools of war, and I don't feel there's a war-like challenge going on betwen the narrator and the punisher. There's certainly an almost child-like resentment of being banished from the speaker's "perfect place," but it seems wistful and melancholy, not confrontational. As the author implies stinging, not cutting, with the conclusion, I'm a little bothered by the sharpness brought up by Sun and steel despite the strong alliteration and fit to the rhyme, and because of the distillation of language, that line reads (for me) as the focus of the piece, so it pricks me even more. Overall, I like the poem, and I thought you did a good job with it.

Emma Jane email

A lovely sonnet, very atmospheric and evocative. I read it before looking at the picture and then thought the two matched perfectly. Really like the description of anticipation of the punishment to come. Only minor detraction is the actual resolution isn't explicit in the sonnet.

Dyke Grrl/Jigsaw Analogy email

The focus on the picture (the swing) is great. The poem includes spanking and punishment centrally, but it's very clear that the image was the heart of it. The pacing is also well-done, moving through a different stage of emotion with each stanza. The poem moves briefly towards the incipient spanking, but comes firmly back to the swing with the final lines.