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  #21  
Unread 01-16-2010, 02:14 PM
Roger Slater Roger Slater is offline
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I was trying to be funny with "wilt," Susan, but I guess it felt flat.


I edited my sonnet up above where I posted it originally.

Last edited by Roger Slater; 01-16-2010 at 02:54 PM.
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  #22  
Unread 01-16-2010, 04:27 PM
Martin Elster Martin Elster is offline
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Hi Peter,

"Empty Nest" is quite good -- and melencholy. I can't really think of anything I'd want to change, except the first line, of course.

My poem started out a bit rough, but I'm gradually polishing it. Thanks for your suggestions. I appreciate it. All the things you said are well-taken. I thought "mansion" was just plain old hyperbole. But I changed it to "castle" which sounds better to me. Though it still might be overdone.

Here is the poem again with the revisions so far:

The Trouble

The surface of the field, though undepressed,
still hints at signs of damage in the rain
falling from lemon-clouds. No way to strain
the toxins from this land. An eagle’s nest,
a castle on a lofty bough, is blest
with a pair of peckish fledglings. Soon the chain
of indiscretions by the human brain
will put half of the biosphere to rest.

Where will those eagle chicks be when the blast
of poison takes their prey and starts to wilt
the blossoms, even break eggshells? One day
a tremor might destroy the nest we’ve built.
Watching majestic raptors soaring past,
we miss the fractures in the eggs they lay.

*

Changes:

L5 "castle" was "mansion"
L6 "with a pair of peckish fledglings. Soon the chain"
was "with two young growing chicks. In time this chain"
L9 "Where will those eagle chicks be when the blast"
was "We are those eagle fledgling, and our blast"

Martin

Last edited by Martin Elster; 01-16-2010 at 04:48 PM.
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  #23  
Unread 01-16-2010, 05:51 PM
Jerome Betts Jerome Betts is offline
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Hmmm. . . never tried bouts rimes before. Difficult. Do they have to be serious?

A second draft of my BR piece is in post 30.


.

Last edited by Jerome Betts; 01-18-2010 at 05:00 AM.
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  #24  
Unread 01-16-2010, 06:48 PM
Roger Slater Roger Slater is offline
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I just noticed that I messed up my last one, using "fast" instead of "past." Need to check my glasses, I guess. Here's another:

Most people do not have much fun depressed,
but me, I love my nights of gloomy rain
and gusts of wind that put so great a strain
on every branch where I might put my nest.
Only then, despondent, am I blest,
because I can't be free without a chain
wrapped twice around my melancholy brain
and placing all my thoughts under arrest.

For me there cannot be a bigger blast
than watching all my prize begonias wilt.
A traffic jam can sometimes make my day.
I guess it's just the way that I am built.
Joy is just a phase that, once it's past,
allows me my more grounded form of play.
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  #25  
Unread 01-16-2010, 07:06 PM
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RCL RCL is offline
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Gobblers

Oh! hear the gobbling gobbler, undepressed
By short November days or icy rain.
The Pilgrims’ axes do not still his strain.
Strutting as I lead him from his nest,
He seems so happy, I feel more than blest.
Your song today begins an endless chain,
My gifted gobbler! You’ve eased my battered brain
That plans the feast, no time to sit and rest.
Yes, you and I will sing above the blast
Of winter winds. We’ll gobble, if thou wilt,
Sing loud and clear, first you then I, this day.
Thankful for the homestead I have built,
I’ll make you succulent (honoring your past),
when you have finally gobbled your last lay.



Ralph
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Ralph

Last edited by RCL; 01-21-2010 at 03:49 PM. Reason: punctuation
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  #26  
Unread 01-16-2010, 09:14 PM
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Spindleshanks Spindleshanks is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by John Whitworth View Post
Could Lord A have said undepressed?
John, could and did.

His genial humour even undepressed
By seventeen successive days of rain


From The Pongo Papers in description of the Cormorant.

Interesting that we find here the exact sequence of final words as presented in the first two lines of the challenge. Coincidence? It's interesting, too, that Douglas in his sonnets follows the Petrarchan scheme and occasionally departs from the sestet rhyme sequence model in the same manner as the challenge.

Bob, if you haven't read The Pongo Papers, it's a must-do for you.

Peter
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  #27  
Unread 01-16-2010, 10:13 PM
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John Whitworth John Whitworth is offline
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No, Jerome, they do NOT have to be serious, and neither do sonnets. In fact NOTHING has to be serious. But then I would say that.
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  #28  
Unread 01-17-2010, 01:34 AM
Peter Wyton Peter Wyton is offline
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I'm still in a sulk because this didn't cut it in the 'Strad' competition

LAURIEL LEEF


The name is Stroudivarius, not Strad.
A village near that town produced a lad
Of diverse gifts, amongst whose myriad
Accomplishments, the violin he had
Earned his first crust. The hamlet boys hurrahed,
Good looking girls like Rosie oohed and aahed
When he put bow to fiddle. One must add
That he went on to pen an iliad
About the Spanish war, wrote not bad
Poems and prose throughout his life, but sad
To say, hailed not from Cremona, but Slad.

On the other hand, I'm ever hopeful about this for the bouts-rimes

BOUTS-RIMES

I haven’t been this undepressed
since Gran danced naked in the rain.
Her G.P. put it down to strain,
not knowing I had placed a nest
of vipers in her bidet. Blest
if I know why she left her chain
of sex shops to Oxfam. My brain
equated this with all the rest
of her eccentricities. Blast
the old bat. May her cadaver wilt
throughout each suppurating day
within the catafalque I built
to emphasise her sordid past
upon the road to Mandalay.

Peter Wyton
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  #29  
Unread 01-17-2010, 05:18 AM
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John Whitworth John Whitworth is offline
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Peter, I think you could win with this, because of the octosyllabic format. I think the eccentricities line doesn't QUITE scan, or maybe I'm not saying it right.
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  #30  
Unread 01-17-2010, 08:07 AM
Jerome Betts Jerome Betts is offline
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Yes, fun stuff, Peter. Liked the vipers in the bidet, the Oxfam legacy and the Mandalay reference. Does the Gloucester Citizen still print readers' verses about elvers in season, or has climate change done for them?

Final version of my BR attempt is in Post 37

.

Last edited by Jerome Betts; 01-18-2010 at 05:17 AM.
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