Dirty: Sherlock Holmes (Granada): Poetry: Somehow Impure

[okapi1895.livejournal.com]

Title: Somehow Impure

Fandom: Sherlock Holmes (Granada)

Rating: Gen

Length: 91

Content Notes: Italian sonnet; inspired by a scene in the Granada TV version of the canon story “The Creeping Man” where Alice Morphy asks her friend Edith Presbury to tell her father (who is Alice’s fiancée) to stop sending her orchids because they are ‘somehow impure.’ This scene is not in the original story.

Summary: The orchids unsettle Alice.

Author’s Note: I believe the orchid used in the scene is an Odontioda Victoria Village, a modern white hybrid, bred from the species Odontoglossum crispum. It is white and frilly with faint gold touches and very dark red-violet spots at the centre.

Unfurled uncurled the white majestic bloom’d
Like flags announcing royalty’s parade
Exotic beauty, pale, in glass displayed
Inviting praise, exhaling breath perfumed
A golden kiss adorns each blossom plumed
On silk wan, magenta caress betrayed.
A courtesan’s expression, guarded, staid
That hints of buried lies and loves exhumed.

O hateful blooms! Love’s emissary not!
Too knowing, bold for maiden young demure
Thy folds and frills remind what’s best forgot
Reveal, expose too much to one unsure
Be gone! My heart’s unsettled, my nerves wrought
By flowers fair, but oh, somehow impure!

Comments

[laurose8.livejournal.com]

Thank you for letting us read this lovely, little orchid of a poem.

[okapi1895.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much! It's for the Dirty challenge but I kept it clean (for Alice's sake!).

[thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com]

Delighted you've written your orchid poem. Your description of the orchid is great.

[okapi1895.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much! You know exactly how long this one has been brewing. I had so much of it written in my head, it was just a question of putting all the pieces together and a bit of tinkering (of course!). I think the Italian sonnet form fits it nicely.

[scfrankles.livejournal.com]

Well, it was worth the wait ^^

I especially like: A courtesan’s expression, guarded, staid/ That hints of buried lies and loves exhumed. It suggests the carefully cultivated beauty of the orchid - a beauty that's no longer natural. And the second line suggests Professor Presbury's secret treatment and his "revitalisation" ^^"

I like the way you describe the beauty of the orchid in the octave and then use the sestet to show us Miss Morphy's reaction to it. I particularly like: Thy folds and frills remind what’s best forgot/ Reveal, expose too much to one unsure. And a nice use of the programme's phrase in your last line.

[okapi1895.livejournal.com]

Nice to hear considering how long it's been!

I went back to the links from Mrs. Hudson's page and read about Italian sonnet and there's supposed to be a 'turn' at the end of the first eight so it's very deliberate the shift.

Yeah the last line is the whole point. Such a loaded phrase. Thank you so much for reading and commenting.

[debriswoman]

Beautifully thought out and put together:-)

[okapi1895.livejournal.com]

Thank you! It's been a long time coming.