I was trying to be funny with "wilt," Susan, but I guess it felt flat.
I edited my sonnet up above where I posted it originally. |
Hi Peter,
"Empty Nest" is quite good -- and melencholy. I can't really think of anything I'd want to change, except the first line, of course. My poem started out a bit rough, but I'm gradually polishing it. Thanks for your suggestions. I appreciate it. All the things you said are well-taken. I thought "mansion" was just plain old hyperbole. But I changed it to "castle" which sounds better to me. Though it still might be overdone. Here is the poem again with the revisions so far: The Trouble The surface of the field, though undepressed, still hints at signs of damage in the rain falling from lemon-clouds. No way to strain the toxins from this land. An eagle’s nest, a castle on a lofty bough, is blest with a pair of peckish fledglings. Soon the chain of indiscretions by the human brain will put half of the biosphere to rest. Where will those eagle chicks be when the blast of poison takes their prey and starts to wilt the blossoms, even break eggshells? One day a tremor might destroy the nest we’ve built. Watching majestic raptors soaring past, we miss the fractures in the eggs they lay. * Changes: L5 "castle" was "mansion" L6 "with a pair of peckish fledglings. Soon the chain" was "with two young growing chicks. In time this chain" L9 "Where will those eagle chicks be when the blast" was "We are those eagle fledgling, and our blast" Martin |
Hmmm. . . never tried bouts rimes before. Difficult. Do they have to be serious?
A second draft of my BR piece is in post 30. . |
I just noticed that I messed up my last one, using "fast" instead of "past." Need to check my glasses, I guess. Here's another:
Most people do not have much fun depressed, but me, I love my nights of gloomy rain and gusts of wind that put so great a strain on every branch where I might put my nest. Only then, despondent, am I blest, because I can't be free without a chain wrapped twice around my melancholy brain and placing all my thoughts under arrest. For me there cannot be a bigger blast than watching all my prize begonias wilt. A traffic jam can sometimes make my day. I guess it's just the way that I am built. Joy is just a phase that, once it's past, allows me my more grounded form of play. |
Gobblers
Oh! hear the gobbling gobbler, undepressed By short November days or icy rain. The Pilgrims’ axes do not still his strain. Strutting as I lead him from his nest, He seems so happy, I feel more than blest. Your song today begins an endless chain, My gifted gobbler! You’ve eased my battered brain That plans the feast, no time to sit and rest. Yes, you and I will sing above the blast Of winter winds. We’ll gobble, if thou wilt, Sing loud and clear, first you then I, this day. Thankful for the homestead I have built, I’ll make you succulent (honoring your past), when you have finally gobbled your last lay. Ralph |
Quote:
His genial humour even undepressed By seventeen successive days of rain From The Pongo Papers in description of the Cormorant. Interesting that we find here the exact sequence of final words as presented in the first two lines of the challenge. Coincidence? It's interesting, too, that Douglas in his sonnets follows the Petrarchan scheme and occasionally departs from the sestet rhyme sequence model in the same manner as the challenge. Bob, if you haven't read The Pongo Papers, it's a must-do for you. Peter |
No, Jerome, they do NOT have to be serious, and neither do sonnets. In fact NOTHING has to be serious. But then I would say that.
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I'm still in a sulk because this didn't cut it in the 'Strad' competition
LAURIEL LEEF The name is Stroudivarius, not Strad. A village near that town produced a lad Of diverse gifts, amongst whose myriad Accomplishments, the violin he had Earned his first crust. The hamlet boys hurrahed, Good looking girls like Rosie oohed and aahed When he put bow to fiddle. One must add That he went on to pen an iliad About the Spanish war, wrote not bad Poems and prose throughout his life, but sad To say, hailed not from Cremona, but Slad. On the other hand, I'm ever hopeful about this for the bouts-rimes BOUTS-RIMES I haven’t been this undepressed since Gran danced naked in the rain. Her G.P. put it down to strain, not knowing I had placed a nest of vipers in her bidet. Blest if I know why she left her chain of sex shops to Oxfam. My brain equated this with all the rest of her eccentricities. Blast the old bat. May her cadaver wilt throughout each suppurating day within the catafalque I built to emphasise her sordid past upon the road to Mandalay. Peter Wyton |
Peter, I think you could win with this, because of the octosyllabic format. I think the eccentricities line doesn't QUITE scan, or maybe I'm not saying it right.
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Yes, fun stuff, Peter. Liked the vipers in the bidet, the Oxfam legacy and the Mandalay reference. Does the Gloucester Citizen still print readers' verses about elvers in season, or has climate change done for them?
Final version of my BR attempt is in Post 37 . |
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