Yes. What you both said. When a verse form has lasted 700 years (is that about right?) it is inevitable that poets will play with it, subvert it, turn it inside out. If what remains has enough recognisable elements of one of the more traditional sonnet forms, then it's still a sonnet – of sorts. This is clearly a sonnet (fourteen lines, Shakespearen (half) -rhyme scheme, volta). Ricks 15 liners are sonnets because they feel like them and that one extra line is the slight adaptation of the form. Push it too far and it something else. A 16 liner would go too far. A 14 line poem with none of the other elements would go too far.
I recommend "Irresistible Sonnets", the wonderful book edited by our own Mary Meriam. 70 contemporary sonnets running the gamut from traditional to experimental. Available to order from Amazon (pay me later Mary...)
Last edited by Mark McDonnell; 06-24-2020 at 02:32 AM.
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