Can My Poetry Get Any Worse?

Saturday, January 31, 2009

Best Friends Suck (Epigram)

In the event that I might die you must take my old cab
Back to Chinatown with sixty dollars and pay my tab

Debt (Blank Verse)

Reach within and open the envelope
Ink stains a marker of success today
If not progress to further your own door
Resting tomorrow's fate to accountants

Cellphone (Vers Libre)

Ding ding ding!
The phone is ringing

Ching ching ching!
The phone is ringing

Bang bang bang!
The phone is ringing

Beeeeeep!
I think I should answer that

Gift of God (Vers Libre)

Tell me I'm crazy
For discerning truth
'Cause while you were speaking
I could swear
I met God

Friday, January 30, 2009

The Snake Won't Bite, I Hope... (Curtal Sonnet)

There is no room for unopened green eyes
When legitimate sparkles shine for me
Those snakes will coil my day 'til their sun rise
Adjourning mine own with my tears as prize
Leeching from neck to brain, I will not see
As pride may trench upon my guise
Instead, I say, open my eyes- perhaps
To mend the heart's cynicism, and yours
Pending discouragements, dividing gaps
From which the good will birth within hours
To hope truce, perhaps...

Forgiving Phrases (Vers Libre)

It's of the loveliest day
I must admit
That love in trial
Cannot
And in confusion
Will not
Change a cynical heart
For a stone cannot swim
And ice will never fly
Until God's hand reaches in
To form a miracle

Once, Life was Kind (English Sonnet)

As your sun may set in our west
Your east dawns the illuminating sky
From the entry of open doors
We dine in honest nicety-reply
Lending hands place the luncheon spoon to
The empty pocket of whom once had some
Though times may change the heart turns warm
In winter cold bringing, comes His kingdom
Upon open windows when there's no door
Hope's breath casts in singing the gracious song
For the sparing and kind give more in treat
To gleam a candle from match girl's who long
This is your life and theirs much so in part
Living it once; your sun- that golden heart

igottalearnmesome

What if you could enter a spoken word session using actual traditional poetry form?

--------------------------

Ode:
A poem able to be sung. A lyric poem of some length, usually of a serious or meditative nature and having an elevated style and formal stanzaic structure. Typically with an odd meter to it's structure.

~KEATES ODE FORMAT~
1_split couplet.
*_one line that rhymes with the third line of the following quatrain.
1_quatrain that has the second line rhyme with the last line after
*_like a sonnet, it is a pentameter

~KIPLING ODE FORMAT~
1_split couplet
1_couplet

Elegy :
A sad and thoughtful poem lamenting the death of a person.

Cinquain :
A cinquain has five lines.
Line 1 is one word (the title)
Line 2 is two words that describe the title.
Line 3 is three words that tell the action
Line 4 is four words that express the feeling
Line 5 is one word that recalls the title

Blank verse :
Poetry that is written in unrhymed iambic pentameter. Blank verse is often unobtrusive and the iambic pentameter form often resembles the rhythms of ordinary speech. Shakespeare wrote most of his plays in blank verse.

Ballade:
A type of poem, usually with three stanzas of seven, eight, or ten lines and a shorter final stanza of four or five lines. All stanzas end with the same one-line refrain.

ABC poem :
An ABC poem has 5 lines that create a mood, picture, or feeling. Lines 1 through 4 are made up of words, phrases or clauses - and the first word of each line is in alphabetical order from the first word. Line 5 is one sentence, beginning with any letter.

Ballad :
A poem that tells a story similar to a folk tale or legend and often has a repeated refrain.

Epigram :
A very short, satirical and witty poem usually written as a brief couplet or quatrain. The term epigram is derived from the Greek word epigramma, meaning inscription.
The epigram was cultivated in the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries by poets like Ben Jonson and John Donne

Quatrain :
A stanza or poem of four lines.
Lines 2 and 4 must rhyme.
Lines 1 and 3 may or may not rhyme.
Rhyming lines should have a similar number of syllables.

Senryu :
A short Japanese poem that is similar to a haiku in structure but treats human beings rather than nature, often in a humorous or satiric way.

Tanka :
A Japanese poem of five lines, the first and third composed of five syllables and the rest of seven.

Terza rima :
A type of poetry consisting of 10 or 11 syllable lines arranged in three-line "tercets". The poet Dante is credited with inventing terza rima and it has been used by many English poets including Chaucer, Milton, Shelley, and Auden.

Terza rima is a three-line stanza using chain rhyme in the pattern a-b-a, b-c-b, c-d-c, d-e-d. There is no limit to the number of lines, but poems or sections of poems written in terza rima end with either a single line or couplet repeating the rhyme of the middle line of the final tercet. The two possible endings for the example above are d-e-d, e or d-e-d, e-e. There is no set rhythm for terza rima, but in English, iambic pentameters are generally preferred.

Sonnet :
English (or Shakespearean) sonnets are lyric poems that are 14 lines long falling into three coordinate quatrains and a concluding couplet.

Rhyme royal :
A type of poetry introduced by Geoffrey Chaucer consisting of stanzas of seven lines in iambic pentameter.

Chant royal:
A poetic form that consists of five eleven-line stanzas with a rhyme scheme a-b-a-b-c-c-d-d-e-d-E and a five-line envoi rhyming d-d-e-d-E or a seven-line envoi c-c-d-d-e-d-E.

Rondeau:
A form of French verse also used in English language poetry. It makes use of refrains, repeated according to a certain stylized pattern. It was customarily regarded as a challenge to arrange for these refrains to contribute to the meaning of the poem in as succinct and poignant a manner as possible. The rondeau consists of thirteen lines of eight syllables, plus two refrains (which are half lines, each of four syllables), employing, altogether, only three rhymes. It has three stanzas and its rhyme scheme is as follows: (1) A A B B A (2) A A B with refrain: C (3) A A B B A with concluding refrain C. The refrain must be identical with the beginning of the first line.

Dorsimbra
Made up of three quatrains. The first and twelfth lines are the same. Generally, the first quatrain is Sicilian—four lines iambic pentameter rhymed abab. The second quatrain is snappy free verse. The third quatrain is blank verse—unrhymed iambic pentameter. The best ones use enjambment, internal rhymes, and slant rhymes to bind the three stanzas.

Vignette Poetry:
Relay a short moment in time with visual and emotional impact. Rhyme and specific meter are not required. Alliteration and internal rhyme are virtual necessities. VIGNETTE is a narrative poetry that illustrates a moment in time. It can be written in any traditional form or free verse.

Villanelle:
The villanelle has no established meter, although most nineteenth-century villanelles have used trimeter or tetrameter and most twentieth-century villanelles have used pentameter. The essence of the fixed modern form is its distinctive pattern of rhyme and repetition. The rhyme-and-refrain pattern of the villanelle can be schematized as A1bA2 abA1 abA2 abA1 abA2 abA1A2 where letters ("a" and "b") indicate the two rhyme sounds, upper case indicates a refrain ("A"), and superscript numerals (1 and 2) indicate Refrain 1 and Refrain 2.

Refrain 1 (A1)
Line 2 (b)
Refrain 2 (A2)

Line 4 (a)
Line 5 (b)
Refrain 1 (A1)

Line 7 (a)
Line 8 (b)
Refrain 2 (A2)

Line 10 (a)
Line 11 (b)
Refrain 1 (A1)

Line 13 (a)
Line 14 (b)
Refrain 2 (A2)

Line 16 (a)
Line 17 (b)
Refrain 1 (A1)
Refrain 2 (A2)

Can My Poetry Get Any Worse?

Saturday, January 31, 2009

Best Friends Suck (Epigram)

Debt (Blank Verse)

Cellphone (Vers Libre)

Gift of God (Vers Libre)

Friday, January 30, 2009

The Snake Won't Bite, I Hope... (Curtal Sonnet)

Forgiving Phrases (Vers Libre)

Once, Life was Kind (English Sonnet)

Main Pages

Contests Participated In

Applying Poetry

Blog Archive

About Me

Beats to Trebles

Favorite Artists

Philosophical Influences

Greatest Teachers

My Blog List

M Series

Poetry Resources

It's all about you (3)

igottalearnmesome