Here's an old thread on the cinquain that may antagonize some, be of interest to others.

http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/ubbhtm...ML/001324.html

I skimmed it; I'll read it; I guessed it.

Here's a nifty haiku in iambs. Seems to me stress counting works better than syllable counting in the imported Asian forms.

Pertinax

Let chaos storm!
Let cloud shapes swarm!
I wait for form.

- Robert Frost

Nothing new under the sun, is there! Just folks who have not found out about it yet.

I am sure I will enjoy this thread, but not tonight. It is 6.38 a.m. here and time and this graveyard shift is over.

But I will have something to look forward to tomorrow! Not least being regaled by your caustic wit.

PS I am working my way through forms. You will probably see worse things. Ghazals, gazelles, whatever.

Here's the old Musing on Mastery thread referred to in Michael's link:

http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/ubbhtm...ML/000553.html

Frank: yes, it is.

I especially like this Lorine Niedecker from the thread you started, Patricia.

Linnaeus in Lapland

Nothing worth noting
except an Andromeda
with quadrangular shoots--
the boots
of the people

wet inside: they must swim
to church thru the floods
or be taxed--the blossoms
from the bosoms
of the leaves.

~~~

Like you, I found this paragraph fascinating when I read it the other day here: http://www.karenalkalay-gut.com/crapsey.htm.

~~~
Janice - that link to Mary Moore's thread doesn't work.

Mary, It works when I click it! Try again.

I have laughed my way through the Michael thread, shades from my arty-farty youth, when poetry and Satre reigned and the room was full of cigarette smoke and earnestness. (choke, choke.)

I'm lovin' it.

Coming up next is the Patricia thread.

Editing in to say that now I have read the Patricia thread and it was greatly enjoyed.

There is a challenge in the small format. I think you have write a few dozen to get one worth keeping.

Anyway, I have written a lot throwaways last night, and my best were none too good.

But hey! It's a workshop!

I'm thinking some more examples might turn up. Here or in threads of their own. Time will tell.

Past and Later

The past
Still lingers on
Although it all is gone
Except for thoughts that linger on
In me.

What will
Be who can tell?
Some heaven or some hell?
Though more of what has been is all
I see.

Frank,

I know you can find something besides 'linger' so as not to use it twice in such a short poem. I want L3 to be re-arranged thusly, "Although it IS ALL gone" rather than "it ALL IS". But that may not sound as natural to you as it does to me. Perhaps IT, is the problem, because ALL IS GONE sounds fine to me unless you put IT after ALL. Now I've twisted all our tongues!

On the 2nd Cinquain - I get it, but find it lacking in hope, which seems essential to life. Perhaps if you add a third, some hope will resurface.

Anne

Today's trivia sample from Janice.

The old-timers can say ho-hum and skip this, but the ill-informed newbies (like me) might find it interesting.

Looking for something else this a.m. I discovered in L. Turco's "Book of Forms" an entry that has bearing on our current topic, the cinquain.

The rubliw is a form invented by Richard Wilbur, called the Epistle and he exemplifies it thus :

Rubliw for Dana Gioia

Dear Dan-
a, in the main,
A rubliw is a skein
Of monorhymes making a chain
To this point that's formally a cinquain,
But then the lines, like a train
Losing cars, refrain
And start to wane
Again.

(My italics and boldfacing.) The form is all messed up becaue I have forgotten how to insert white spaces to indent. But if you have the book (everybody reading this has the book!) you will see the correct indentation and also a diagram.

More trivia is that Mr. Turco includes a rubliw by himself in reply to a rubliw written by Richard Wilbur and with reference to Sam Gwynn. (I love serendipitous stuff like this, it's like unexpectedly hearing a friend talking on the radio or running into your daughter in Shanghai. Assuming you are not both Chinese and living in the same apartment, of course.)