entry is part of the last series. And I thought, last evening to bring the other one forward, so I swapped it with the entry that was on the 29 of October, which now, I believe is somewhere around August 17th–just now I cannot remember exactly. Although this evening, I shall re-investigate.
Monthly Archives: October 2015
A Supernova Exploded
This was very nice. I thought I’d write a sonnet from this–I do love the outer reaches so.
Writing about the beauty of the human form…
…is a very enjoyable pursuit. I do quite a lot of it, however not so much in sonnet form. I’ve endeavored to rectify that with this mornings offering.
This morning’s offering…
…(seen here) will probably be lucased to a greater or lesser degree (but more likely, greater) for a week or so. The constraints on it were a bit of a challenge; therefore, a word or two (or three) will–or, at least, might–continue to change every so often; as I stated, probably for a week–maybe more.
It was inspired by this post, and by a discussion on and around it, among other things.
This one has a different rhymescheme, also: abba abbab cdcdc. The extra “b” rhyme seemed appropriate considering the offering as a whole.
Today’s sonnet was written in a different way–much different than the way in which I usually write.
1) The subject was chosen in advance.
2) The first letters of each line spell something.
3) There is a slightly unorthodox rhymescheme–modified Italian.
4) Both these starting letters and the ending rhyme words were chosen in advance, not completely at random, but not especially carefully either. I picked rhyming classes from among well known groups of words, and I avoided words that had a “silly” character, and/or a character which was, out of character, so to speak, for the piece.
5) Only after all these elements were in place did I get down to composing the piece.
I did enjoy that process very much, and it kept me from writing something that was too concrete sounding–less like a scientist and more like and artist, I suppose one might say.
So is my poetry…
…fairly grounded to the earth. I think this must involve my science background in some way. There is not such ambiguity as one might find in other poetry. I think I should see what the limits of my ability to blend metaphors with concrete earthly ideas might be. (or perhaps I should say “mix metaphors?!”)
In any event, the unfinished, yet famous “My love has wings…”/”Nightingale Woman” might be a worthy pursuit. Since according to lore it should have been a sonnet. Various writers have attempted to finish it while retaining, to some degree, its basic rhythm, and on the other hand, ignoring or not being able to perceive that the known lines are indeed the first two lines of a sonnet, albeit with one syllable missing in the first line–a minor point, and not at all unusual. In fact, sonnets appearing as early as 1600 observed pentametric rhythm without maintaining, in the strictest sense, iambic feet. Still the five beats are heard:
My love has wings,
slender, feathered things
with grace in upswept curve
and tapered tip
These lines are often written as above, although this strikes me as a rendering to paper ones auditory impression of the lines. But I’m no forensic expert in this matter. For all I know, these lines might have been rendered thus in the original script (“Where no man has gone before” – Gene Roddenberry) In any case, format the lines as follows and you will see their true form begin to unfold:
My love has wings, slender, feathered things
With grace in upswept curve and tapered tip…
And due, in large part, to my reading (and writing) of many many sonnets, I would further venture that these first two lines imply an English Sonnet. Here we have two stylistically similar lines, yet distinctly different. The first with its internal rhyme, and missing syllable; the second with it’s five iambic feet and alliterative ending, suggest a ABAB style rhymescheme.
I have done it!!!
I have, indeed, completed all the “<— previous — view — next —>” links. I have been working on it a little at a time. And now I am done! Sometimes I would add the links from the older toward the newer. Sometimes, since I have been adding the links to all the new posts, I have added some at the front, slowly working my way from the newer to the older. Occasionally, I have done some editing on a sonnet or introduction somewhere in between, and have added the links while I was there, which made the process seem faster–like being dealt a wild card, or a free square in a crossword, or in “Scrabble.”
Now I can go back to archiving the site posts in skydrive, which had been my “do it when I have free time” project, prior to this.
The Job That Doesn’t Exist | mishaburnett
I want to say, at the outset here, I mean no disrespect to the young lady above; however one thing I believe I didn’t make clear in the above post is that the business of writing, at its core hasn’t changed all that much. People who claim it has, have, most likely not made a study of writing as a profession throughout history. Continue reading
David Emeron: Sonnets 