[Anne Bryant-Hamon]

Sin Quain

Sin, Cain
did to Abel
while gathering his grain.
Ever since, we've cursed the wetness
of rain.

[Frank Hubeny]

There must have been a thread I missed which is not unlikely since I only have time to read about 10% of them. Anyway, Anne and Shaun, here's a water one for both of you, formatted to fit the Cinquain constraint. I'm glad Mary said to use iambs and John introduced rhyme.

Spring Flood

Spring rains
Are often good
For crops although floods could
Rush over where I planted with
Such care.

[Shaun J. Russell]

That's nice, Frank. Good one.

Here's an attempt at a cinquain sequence. Let me know what you think.


Above And Beyond

The greats
Of poetry
Care not for how we write,
They need no supplication or
Applause

For they
Within their graves
Are subjects of, and slaves
To entropy's dominion, and
Its laws

And yet
Some feel the need
To propagate the creed
That any poem now written has
No cause

As though
The resting souls
Of poetry and prose
Will rise again to explicate
Our flaws

But no,
It's not a test:
To serve the great ones best
Just write work that both mollifies
And awes.

[Frank Hubeny]

I liked the pattern of rhymes, linking the last word in each stanza, Shaun. I realize that there is hope for this form after all.

Here's an attempt to continue your dead poet theme, if I got it right. I was going to title this "Bury em Deep".



Dead poets
Now are gone,
But some still linger on,
Since profs insist that some of them
Be read.

And some
No doubt are good,
Write better than I could,
Write better even when they're cold
And dead.

[Anne Bryant-Hamon]

Frank and Shuan,

I'm afraid you boys have out-done me. I'm going to sulk about it for a while till I can come up with a superior idea.


Anne

[Mary Meriam]

<A HREF="http://www.worldhaikureview.org/2-1/whcessay_cinquaindb.shtml" TARGET=_blank>
Have you read this essay yet, mes amis?</A>

Let's remember that the cinquain is imagistic. So far, I'd say Anne is most in tune with the image aspect of the cinquain. How about some senses: sight, sound, taste, touch, smell. Am I on the right track, Janice?

Niagara, Seen on a Night in November

How frail
Above the bulk
Of crashing water hangs
Autumnal, evanescent, wan,
The moon.

- Adelaide Crapsey



[This message has been edited by Mary Meriam (edited June 21, 2008).]

[Anne Bryant-Hamon]

Mary,

That is an excellent link. Some of the cinquain examples there are beautiful. I think that often the most profound poems are concise. I like the idea that the Cinquain ought to produce an image in the way that haiku does. The link you posted is the only "study" I've done of the form.

Thanks -
Anne

_______________________

This one's not highly imagistic, but I'm picturing
something deadly being thought of as a game (tennis racket smashing balls)....

I rack
my brain in vain
to find some good in war
only to conclude its just a
racket

[Barbara Godwin]

A dog,
not barking, knew
he would not last the day.
A man stood by and laughed at him;
Ich nicht.

[This message has been edited by Barbara Godwin (edited June 22, 2008).]

[Janice D. Soderling]

Mary Moore, in another cinquain thread in Non-Met has provided all of us who thirst for knowledge with a link to further information on cinquains.
http://members.aol.com/acinquain/index.html

Note also that both Mary and Seree have cinquained in Non-Met.

In answer to your question, Mary Thread-Starter, (and thanks for this good idea) my personal interest leans more to the imagistic qualities but I have taken a look in several other prosody tomes and examples were as far-ranging as the examples in this thread. For instance, in L. Turco's "Book of Forms", he cites an old Irish poem that does roughly what Anne does above, uses word similarity in the first and last lines to create a circular effect.

The way John has developed the form by incorporating rhyme and wit is to have created a parallel form akin to clerihews and limericks. Maybe the form should be called a Johnquain when it incorporates rhyme and whit? (sorry, my finger slipped there, I mean rhyme and wit.)

Still, my personal challenge is to strive to achieve an aesthetic quality that lifts the cinquain off the page. (*ha, ha, good luck, Janice, guffaws her inner muse and exits right.*)

[John Whitworth]

Janice you are right. What I have done, and Frank and Shuan, is not what the lovely Adelaide envisaged. And, Mary, I have read the article. How sad! I am afraid that my epitaph will be a line from that excellent and perhaps underrated American novelist, Peter de Vriess.

Deep down
you're shallow!