Hello Jay O'Toole!
I hope that this review proves helpful to you. Please remember that everybody has different tastes. My critique is the opinion of only one person and offered in the spirit of constructive criticism with a hope that it will be useful if you decide to further develop or edit your poem.
What I liked about your poem
I love the resolution of your poem, and the beautiful way you craft your allegorical tale to match the salvation through blood and the notion of victory through death. I also really like the references to both Narnia and Middle Earth, tying them together in your story.
I think it was very brave and skilful of you to use anapestic tetrameter to structure your poem.
I particularly loved this idea: For he knew as we do that no flame can o'erpower / one whose chimney-soot coat has its day and its hour! - I loved this bit about Santa's flame retardant coat. Great idea!
What I feel may need some work in your poem
This isn't just a poem, it's an epic ballad, a story poem. As such, I'm going to review it in two ways. First, as a story. Second, as a poem.
Story Stuff
The key elements to a story are plot, character development, and resolution. Your resolution is brilliant. Your plot, however, at times, for me, became a little confusing. However, the biggest issue I had was with initial setting and character development.
You begin the first quatrain by introducing a unicorn (though it's not clear if it's one or two unicorns at that stage because of the language used) who is not named, although it's clear he's the protagonist, and a character called Reepicheep, and it's stated that they're fighting a battle as "Earth was torn". The capitalisation of Earth implies that this story is set on our world of Earth, which then confused me as the story progressed as it becomes clear that it's actually in Narnia. This opening could potentially be a great hook if the reader understands who Reepicheep is. However, you're really over-relying, imho, on the reader already being familiar with Reepicheep as a character. Anybody who does not know who Reepicheep is will not understand who or what he is at all.
You see, in order to create the necessary suspension of disbelief (a term originally coined for poetry by Samule Taylor Coleridge, who incidentally believed that the only original poetry was that inspired by the Holy Spirt, and he put that in his biography alongside this suspension of disbelief concept) you need to make the story clear in the reader's mind. The reader needs to be able to visualise it. If the reader does not know that Reepicheep is a mouse holding a sword, a lot of the stuff later will be very confusing. You never really establish very clearly what Reepicheep is, and so without actually knowing this before reading your poem, a reader will quite simply not get that element of your story and will not be able to create a strong image of what is going on in their head as they read.
When you're reading a story, the protagonist's name is really important. You need to bring it in as soon as possible in order to create a connection between the reader and the character. It's difficult to care about someone if you don't know their name, but once you know their name then they become much more important to you — you simply care more about people you know. You bring in Bob's name here:
After touch and great breath Bob, the Unicorn flew - by the time we reach this line, we're already a third of the way into the story. Because Bob is your protagonist, he really needs naming much earlier than this, ideally in your opening stanza.
Technical Poetry Stuff
I was really surprised that you chose to use anapestic meter for this. You see, Jay, I KNOW that you're really, really good at common meter (what you call hymnal) and so ballad meter (almost identical to common but rhymed ABCB and with looser construction and meter allowed) would be a doddle for you. IMHO, this poem would have had a more natural sound if you'd used ballad meter. For example, the line "'Twas a pink and a fluffy wee unicorn". In normal language, you'd never say, "it was a pink and a fluffy wee unicorn" because it implies that youre talking about two unicorns, one pink and the other fluffy, when actually there's only one. It's confusing.
Anapestic meter is really, really tough, and generally you did a great job. However, I did stumble on the opening stanza. Compare the first two stanzas and perhaps you'll understand why. Here's my rough stress analysis of your first two quatrains, bearing in mind that British people do sometimes stress things differently. However, the checks I made were to a standard US resource:
'Twas a pink and a fluffy wee un-i-corn - missing end stress to conclude fourth anapest
in the heart of the battle as Earth was torn. - missing unstressed syllable making last foot an iamb rather than an anapest
Reepicheep by his side, rap-i-er wit and drawn sword, - one syllable too many in third foot
facing down ev'ry foe for the Glorious Lord!
"Take a look at this pony! We'll mince all this meat!"
bellowed Azog, Defiler, the white orc they'd greet.
"Move a step and we'll send thee to Hell in a box!"
cried the un-i-corn standing with Fox in his socks.
https://www.howmanysyllables.com/words/rapier
https://www.howmanysyllables.com/words/unicorn
"Our Dear Aslan has moved. All of Narnia is won! - four syllables (three unstressed, one stressed) in your final foot.
thus attending forever his spiritual gout - four syllables (three unstressed, one stressed) in your final foot.
https://www.howmanysyllables.com/words/spiritual
Conclusion — a summary of how this reader personally felt about your poem.
Overall, I really liked your poem. I loved the resolution, and the theme was fantastic. However, I felt that the beginning was really confusing, especially for anybody unfamiliar with the Narnia universe. I also liked the use of anapestic meter, but felt that it might have worked better (my personal opinion) in ballad meter.
Thank you for sharing your poem with me. Good luck with your writing.
Best wishes,
Bob
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