Poetry Workshop, February 2011: Glosa

[Lauren Hynde]

Hello, poets.

This year, I am trying to make myself a little bit more present - whenever time permits. As it had been discussed in one thread or another started by my beloved Charlie - and as suggested by my dear friend Tzara - I will get this year's cycle of poetry workshops started with a little something about Glosas. If you are not familiar with this poetic form, now would be a good opportunity to learn something new. If you are, now would be an even better opportunity to stretch those poetic muscles and do some exercise.

The weekend that is about to start is very big for me personally, so we won't be doing anything until Monday. For now, I just want to know who's interested, whether just as a spectator or actively writing poetry. Either way, I'll be badgering you into writing a Glosa. Don't worry, though, it won't hurt.

 

[CharleyH]

I'd sign up if I didn't sleep with you! But I need lessons, so .... fuck it ...I sign up, anyway.

 

[Angeline]

I love the glosa form and you, my beloved Lauren, taught it to me. Maybe this thread will make me want to try another. It's a fun form, very accessible, and one can get very creative with it.

 

[Kaishaku]

I've been severely locked... unable to do anything much poetically for ages, but I am interested in learning of the Glosa form. So if it is as a spectator or participant am certainally interested.


K.

 

[butters]

*quietly takes a seat, gets out notepaper and pen, and waits expectantly*


hey, teach, you wanna apple?

 

[EroticOrogeny]

I'd like to participate, unsure how willing my muse is these days, so may be just an onlooker.
I've sort of stalled on 52 pickup, feeling I should contribute poem(s) - have one started, but ...

 

[Tzara]

For now, I just want to know who's interested, whether just as a spectator or actively writing poetry.

I am! I am!

I am interested in writing glosa, or writing gloze, or perhaps merely glazing eyes who are reading some gloss of my glassy poems, or even just gazing at the hunched backs of girly poets writing glosa that will gleam brilliantly in this thread.

*hack, spit* Glod! I think I have some glottals caught in my throat.

 

[Esperanza_Hidalgo]

Yes, I'll bite. What the hell is a globalist??? Oh, I mean Glosa.

Teeheehee.

I would love poetry workshops; maybe I can actually learn how to write poetry!

 

[Liar]

Either way, I'll be badgering you into writing a Glosa. Don't worry, though, it won't hurt.

You're contraditing yourself. Of course it's gonna hurt. It's a frickin' Glosa. It puts words in my mouth. They will have a fight with the words I put there, and it's gonna be pandemonium. In my mouth. I might need surgery.





Well, I'm here, am I not? Bring it on.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Sign me up I've been forced by you before oops forced to write a Glosa that is but as I'm very rusty something definitely needs re-oiling

 

[PoetGuy]

Glosa? Well, Poet Guy will try it, how best he understands it:

Wood

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the sweet earth's flowing breast

I think that I shall never see
A woman opening to me,

With legs like forkèd limbs, haply
A poem, lovely as a tree.

I'm thinking about sap. Impressed?
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest

Against the sweet earth's flowing breast.
My root leaks love. I'm èmbarràssed.​

Yup. Needs help. Poet Guy needs to sign up for the challenge.

 

[Remec]

*nod*

Yeah, time I try to apportion to specific endeavors seems to evaporate on me lately, but I would like to be in on this.

 

[GuiltyPleasure]

*pulls up a chair*

 

[UnderYourSpell]

*slides my chair over to Tess for a good old natter before Teach arrives (did you like my comment on your poem lol?)*

 

[Lauren Hynde]

3 gloss noun

Definition of GLOSS

1 a : a brief explanation (as in the margin or between the lines of a text) of a difficult or obscure word or expression b : a false and often willfully misleading interpretation (as of a text)
2 a : glossary b : an interlinear translation c : a continuous commentary accompanying a text
3 : commentary, interpretation​

Simply put, the glosa (gloss) is a poem where a certain theme, presented at the beginning as a mote (motto, motif) is recovered and explained, and frequently repeated across one or more stanzas in a fixed position, like a refrain.

Glosas became popular as a formal structure in 15th century lyrical poetry. Technically, the term glosa refers specifically to the stanzas of poesia obrigada a mote (poetry bound to the motif), i.e., it refers to the stanzas that explain and expand on the theme set by the mote.

Initially, this was made within the constraint of medieval poetic compositions like the vilancete, with a seven-line glosa, or like the cantiga, with an eight or ten-line glosa. I might get back to these later in the month, if all goes well.


Progressively, glosas stopped being exclusively written from a two or three-line mote. Entire cantigas, vilancetes or rimances started being used as a mote. The poet was then to repeat and explain each line in succession, creating a new poem of variable size. Within each stanza of the new poetic composition, one or two of those lines would reappear, in any position, as long as that position was kept consistently throughout the stanzas.

Often, two lines were quoted in each stanza, one in the middle and another at the end; other times the two lines would be quoted, one at the beginning and the other in the middle, or both at the end of the stanza. When only one line was quoted per stanza, it would most often appear at the end.

All this goes to say that the length of the glosa would depend on the structure chosen by the poet and on the number of lines of the mote.


Glosar (glossing), became a habit in almost all southern-European courts, and one of the main pastimes of royal household evenings, where all participants were authors and audience to this type of motif-bound composition. Themes glossed mostly involved love or satire, making reference to people known by all.

During Renaissance, the glosa continued to evolve into a structure made of a four-line mote and four stanzas of ten lines, the last of which repeating each of the lines of the initial mote.

It remained one of the most popular forms of poetry in Portugal and Spain throughout the Golden Age, well into the 17th century.

***​

I don't want anyone to feel overwhelmed by any of this, so don't panic if you still feel confused. It's really a very simple form when we get down to it, but I just wanted to give you all a sense of the historical context that surrounds poetry bound to the motif, before we start with some basic exercises and slowly ease into writing our very own glosa, or a modern interpretation of one.

If any of you has any questions about any of this, I'll be happy to respond, to the best of my ability.

 

[GuiltyPleasure]

*slides my chair over to Tess for a good old natter before Teach arrives (did you like my comment on your poem lol?)*

(whispered so LH doesn't get interrupted) Yes, thanks. Those damn turkeys.

 

[butters]

3 gloss noun

Definition of GLOSS

1 a : a brief explanation (as in the margin or between the lines of a text) of a difficult or obscure word or expression b : a false and often willfully misleading interpretation (as of a text)
2 a : glossary b : an interlinear translation c : a continuous commentary accompanying a text
3 : commentary, interpretation​

Simply put, the glosa (gloss) is a poem where a certain theme, presented at the beginning as a mote (motto, motif) is recovered and explained, and frequently repeated across one or more stanzas in a fixed position, like a refrain.

Glosas became popular as a formal structure in 15th century lyrical poetry. Technically, the term glosa refers specifically to the stanzas of poesia obrigada a mote (poetry bound to the motif), i.e., it refers to the stanzas that explain and expand on the theme set by the mote.

Initially, this was made within the constraint of medieval poetic compositions like the vilancete, with a seven-line glosa, or like the cantiga, with an eight or ten-line glosa. I might get back to these later in the month, if all goes well.


Progressively, glosas stopped being exclusively written from a two or three-line mote. Entire cantigas, vilancetes or rimances started being used as a mote. The poet was then to repeat and explain each line in succession, creating a new poem of variable size. Within each stanza of the new poetic composition, one or two of those lines would reappear, in any position, as long as that position was kept consistently throughout the stanzas.

Often, two lines were quoted in each stanza, one in the middle and another at the end; other times the two lines would be quoted, one at the beginning and the other in the middle, or both at the end of the stanza. When only one line was quoted per stanza, it would most often appear at the end.

All this goes to say that the length of the glosa would depend on the structure chosen by the poet and on the number of lines of the mote.


Glosar (glossing), became a habit in almost all southern-European courts, and one of the main pastimes of royal household evenings, where all participants were authors and audience to this type of motif-bound composition. Themes glossed mostly involved love or satire, making reference to people known by all.

During Renaissance, the glosa continued to evolve into a structure made of a four-line mote and four stanzas of ten lines, the last of which repeating each of the lines of the initial mote.

It remained one of the most popular forms of poetry in Portugal and Spain throughout the Golden Age, well into the 17th century.

***​

I don't want anyone to feel overwhelmed by any of this, so don't panic if you still feel confused. It's really a very simple form when we get down to it, but I just wanted to give you all a sense of the historical context that surrounds poetry bound to the motif, before we start with some basic exercises and slowly ease into writing our very own glosa, or a modern interpretation of one.

If any of you has any questions about any of this, I'll be happy to respond, to the best of my ability.

*gulps*

 

[The_Fool]

I got nothing. All my words sound like shit.

 

[butters]

I got nothing. All my words sound like shit.

been at the thesaurus again?


as if. we don't get to read enough of you. now come sit next to me so i can see how you do this.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

errrr what did Teach just say?

 

[The_Fool]

been at the thesaurus again?


as if. we don't get to read enough of you. now come sit next to me so i can see how you do this.

So the way I read it, the mote is like a fervent, arrogant kiss on the lips, in which I share my desires. Then I back off with the glosa, and offer hints, not so much an apology, but a more subtle sense of my passion with kisses to the throat, the neck, the shoulders. Still as fervent, yet not so blatant. Still as passionate, but more of message that lingers in the telling.

 

[Angeline]

So the way I read it, the mote is like a fervent, arrogant kiss on the lips, in which I share my desires. Then I back off with the glosa, and offer hints, not so much an apology, but a more subtle sense of my passion with kisses to the throat, the neck, the shoulders. Still as fervent, yet not so blatant. Still as passionate, but more of message that lingers in the telling.

So what's your Glosa gonna be about?

 

[UnderYourSpell]

So the way I read it, the mote is like a fervent, arrogant kiss on the lips, in which I share my desires. Then I back off with the glosa, and offer hints, not so much an apology, but a more subtle sense of my passion with kisses to the throat, the neck, the shoulders. Still as fervent, yet not so blatant. Still as passionate, but more of message that lingers in the telling.

sod the teach in ...... I'll go for that

 

[The_Fool]

So what's your Glosa gonna be about?

As if I knew.

 

[Liar]

Yep. I'll need surgery.