[David Rosenthal]

I think I shouldn't post it here, because it is in the current issue of "The Lyric." But if you have the issue, you can read it there. It's called "Moon, June, Spoon," and it was workshopped here in TDE a long time ago. "The Lyric" is exactly where it belongs.

Editing in to point out that Cathy Chandler has a good one on the facing page in the same issue of "The Lyric."

David R.

[This message has been edited by David Rosenthal (edited November 24, 2008).]

[Anne Bryant-Hamon]

David,

I have that issue of the Lyric. I enjoyed both your MOON, JUNE SPOON poem and Catherine's "All These Words" after Richard Wilbur's "All These Birds". And I remember someone mentioning that odd Poet's Market ad: "no moon, June, spoon rhyme". I remember thinking ... "is that the only requirement - which words NOT TO USE! Or do you think that publisher meant NO RHYMING poems - period? I always enjoy my copy of The Lyric.

Anne

[Martin Elster]

Blessed or Obsessed?

As I doze beneath the covers in my flannel
PJs, swift as a spine-tailed swift, an amusing
Cavalcade of vivid thoughts comes cruising
Across the waters of my dreaming. Snoozing?
Have I been slumbering? Not anymore!
I reach for paper, pencil. I ignore
The weariness I feel, turn on the light,
Put on my glasses just so I can write
Some scribbles in the middle of the night.
Although I’ve been tremendously inspired,
All of that writing’s making me as tired
As a swimmer who just swam the English Channel.
Then when my muse is done abusing me,
She exits like some trickster full of glee.
I’d rather she were under lock and key,
Because I kind of want her back sometime
To whisper a new metaphor or rhyme.
Though I think she is frequently a pest,
The words she gives me are often better than cash.
Perhaps she went to Mount Olympus to rest.
Perhaps they’re having a bash with lots of hash.
Her absence is just temporary, I hope,
And her high is only hemporary, I dope.

[RCL]

Playful Words

Weighed down by doubt, I can’t attack.
I must unpack
the heavy metaphors that hurt
my heart,
replacing arrows, slings, and swords
with words
that will outwit my uncle’s wards,
trap the mouse—my mother’s dear
defiler of her husband’s ear:
I must unpack my heart with words.


Ralph

[Mary Moore]

This is an early one I wrote when trying to learn meter:

 Iambic Pentameter

From Greek. An ugly term to trip the tongue
and aggravate the ear. Makes harsh demands,
restricting sounds to stresses weak then strong.
Its feet, all five, oppress the muse within.
With features blank, it sets strict rules for verse
and brooks no deviation, even small.
But softens, wed to dulcet Lady Rhyme
and earns a place in sonnet’s paradigm.

[Rose Kelleher]

These are great! Janice, yours makes me want to write a serious one. (An ars poetica as opposed to an arse poetica.)

This one by Maryann is one of my all-time favorite poems about poetry:
Anger Against Sapphics


Here's one of mine.

R's Poetica

A poem should be mean
As a bee

But a B poem may not be.

A poem should move rhythmically in time
As a blacksnake winds

Unseen between skunk cabbages in mud
Rustling up a stink of the sublime

Or failing that,
Rhyme.


[This message has been edited by Rose Kelleher (edited November 26, 2008).]

[FOsen]

Ygor

B-movie elements: the storm, the table,
Still, when the engine whirred and lightning seared
His hand, he hoped for something great and weird
From his uncommon brain (he’d read the label).
At first, things played just like the epic fable;
As he made notes, a madman raved and jeered,
Cried, It’s Alive! then, somehow, disappeared.
The hunched assistant labored on, as able,
Though when he saw the monster’s mangled feet
And heard it mewling in the cruel restraints,
He put it out and shut the door upon it
And on the madman, too. The aide, discrete
Once more, responded to their dim complaints:
Go, maker, fake! And faker, take the sonnet!


BANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POST BANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POSTBANNED POST—Frank

[David Anthony]

Originally posted by Laura Heidy-Halberstein:
If Art Should Ask

If Art should ask me did I suffer for
his sake, I'll tell him no - unless you count
the times I put the sky aside to core
an apple for a baby boy or to mount
a child's butterfly with paper wings
onto a cold refrigerator door.

If Art should ask what song it is that sings
inside my heart, I'll answer quick, before
I've once again forgotten all the words
not written down - but if he feels he needs
a freer melody the caged blue bird's
the better one to ask. She sings for seeds.

She does not know Art's name, nor does she care.
She simply sings whatever songs are there.

--Lovely poem.

[David Anthony]

Stuffing It In

Today I feel the urge to do a sonnet:
I’ll see to it before the morning’s out.
Just one word rhymes with sonnet, but no doubt
a slant can be insinuated—Done it!
So far so good. Enjambment helps: let’s run it
between the lines. I’m half-inclined to flout
the rule insisting on a turn, about
line nine. Screw Petrarch’s horse! Who’d ride in on it?
But like the nag I’m knackered, so let’s try
to reach a lazy climax; soon be there:
just ease it in, far better not to force it.
Sonnets are like those garments ladies buy—
I’m thinking of restraining underwear.
Sometimes the bulges overcome the corset.

[Roger Slater]

Honest Sonnet