View Single Post
  #11  
Unread 07-06-2018, 11:32 AM
Julie Steiner Julie Steiner is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
Posts: 8,358
Default

The sonnenizio is a ridiculously complicated form invented by Kim Addonizio. The first line is taken from someone else's sonnet. Every subsequent line must contain a word from that quotation--sometimes sonically or visually hidden, but always there somehow.

Susan McLean makes the form even more complicated by using endrhyme thoughout. (Addonizio only rhymes the closing couplet.)

Susan published one recently in Mezzo Cammin, linked here:

"Edna St. Vincent's Malaise"
a sonnenizio on a line from A. E. Stallings's "Clean Break"

And here's an earlier tour de force:

Women's Wear Daily: A Sonnenizio

Slip into something easier to wear.
--Ann Drysdale, "The Self I Made You"

Slip into something easier to wear
than underwear designed to pinch and squeeze.
Recall red grooves from strapless bras you swear
are quite unwearable, the agonies
of welts and jabs from corsets, wear and tear
from straps that chafe and thongs that dig. Forswear
footwear with breakneck tilt, stiletto heels.
Remember: wearing fishnet stocking feels
like walking on small BBs. Be aware
that low-cut tops and short skirts show your wares
with each unwary bend or step upstairs.
The cost of all that software's hard to bear.
It suits his hardware now--will he still care
when years have passed and you're the worse for wear?

That one appears on p. 11 of The Whetstone Misses the Knife, Susan's excellent Donald Justice Prize winning book. Everyone who doesn't have a copy should do themselves a favor and immediately request one from Susan.
Reply With Quote