A Golden Chain: Writing in Form

Last week, over at High Calling Blogs, I went on about poetry and elitism— saying (are you surprised?) that we need more room in this world for word celebration. In response, Megan Willome dropped a marvelous poem in the comment box, about how teachers can kill our love of poetry with too much emphasis on form. This reminded me of a T.S. Eliot class I took at NYU; I thought I'd never recover from the relentless focus on every sound, symbol, line break and pattern.

But if you know anything about me, you understand that I love to quibble with myself. So even though I offered the prompt 'I look at you, as if for the first time...' (see the HCB post for more details), I didn't take myself up on it. Instead, I decided to confront my distaste for writing in form and prove that it doesn't have to derail beauty or mercilessly constrain a poet.

Using The Making of a Poem, I read about a form called the 'villanelle.' I thought it was interesting that the authors said this form prevents the telling of a story, because of the way it uses repetition (notice how line 1 is repeated at the end of every other stanza and line 3 is also repeated and then both are repeated as a pair at the end of the poem).

Also, there's a rhyming pattern that switches back and forth. Poets call that aba. Don't worry about it. Just be a detective and find the rhymes yourself; it's more fun that way. Notice that there are 5 stanzas of 3 lines and the 6th has 4 lines. Who comes up with this stuff? Well, apparently Italian farmers had a lot on their minds when they made up songs in the fields, because that is how the villanelle was born.

Here's my go at one, dedicated to a friend who is currently traveling in Sudan.

'A Song of Sudan'

You travel past equator 'til
the sand whips over day
and night descends quite still.

Cloth veils the face of women ill
and well (you cannot say);
you travel past equator 'til

the Nile snakes its shrill
regret of war, while battle is at bay
and night descends quite still.

By morning, sun begins to stalk and fill
the cracks of every hiding place
you travel past equator 'til

deep griefs unravel will
to rebuild shattered clay
and night descends quite still.

An ibis eyes you, dips her beak to kill
some silver flash like bullet play
you travel past equator 'til
the night descends quite still.

(This poem was later published in InsideOut: Poems, International Arts Movement, 2009.)

Gustav Klimt's Lady Poetry, photo by J Barkat. Used with permission.

MORE POETRY:
LL's daughter's The Garden Still, two villanelles and a sestina