Sonnet Smackdown

[Fflow]

I am hereby throwing down the gauntlet of challenge to all poetical types here on the lit forum: Bust out a real, honest to goodness, original sonnet ( Iambic Pentameter, 14 lines, abab cdcd efef gg)

Things to think about: try to tie the beginning and end together thematically, the last 2 lines should be a summation of the previous ones and, if you really want to be traditional, make the theme love. [ These are recommendations, not requirements. ]

To get things started, here's one I just tossed off:

Sonnet

Theology becomes an addled blur
Of cabbages and kings all turned to dust,
But undeniable the pull of her
That walks beyond demise, decay, and rust.

She moves with ease beyond her dearth of days
And laughs without embarrassment or shame
In knowing truth: that visions pierce the haze,
The veil across the river’s flowing flame.

No, Death will not hold sway upon her breast,
Nor penetrate the certainty of faith
She holds within her heart, each beat caressed
With deep abiding love, released her wraith.

Embodied for a moment, then released,
Her spirit lives though body is deceased.






.

 

[Angeline]

I have lots of sonnets

Here's one--

Kiss

Sweet parted lips my own doth parted touch
To inhale your mouth's taste mingled with mine.
Imbibing shared essence thus inasmuch
Unwraps new rapture when two intertwine.

Who know which way a lover's kiss may turn?
One tiny press of flesh and caution leaps
From soft caressing brush to spark then burn,
And gentle glow flares into fire deep.

O' don't ask what draws lovers to this fate,
Or why the world turns on a single kiss,
For humans are drawn to initiate
These tender whispers that engender bliss.

I'll gladly offer my mouth's gift to yours,
And take the offering my own adores.

 

[Angeline]

Deceiver cast yourself away from me
for what is ours never belonged to you.
What call you faith is but hypocrisy,
self-deception. What you cannot renew
in your own world, you sought to rip from mine.
My heart is woman's. While you celebrate
the earth's panoply green, when you incline
mountains like spires, will you contemplate
my mother, know that she lives in my soul,
saw the moon's shame and burned it on your eyes?
Were you unwise to think that it is whole
and fair or do you care that these were lies?
I ever cupped his heart within my hands.
Words are fiction. I know his mouth's commands.

 

[Angeline]

To me all words have fallen from your lips,
Engender moments that but two will know,
Reanimate what we thought sunken ships,
Revealing fate is not starbound, can grow
Errant as wildflowers thrive near rock,
Never defeated, clinging to belief
Conceived anew each dawn as if a clock
Erases every tick of past. Grief
Muted here in the shelter of your arms.
Yes joyless memory is laid to rest.
Our promises renewed, we have left harm's
Nest, faith reborn today within my breast.
Love is inconstant as the changing sea,
Yet you are mine and we are meant to be.

 

[Fflow]

WooHoo!

Danga danga! Your first sonnet sent me spinning wildly out of control. I loved it! I know that kiss! The 2nd was more challenging to me, emotionally. I'm going to need to live with it a little while before I can comment on it meaningfully. I also l really liked the last one.

I wonder if there are any other brave souls around here who, even if they've not written a sonnet before, are willing to give it a bash just for the sake of this thread?

xoxo

Fflow

 

[Angeline]

Danga danga! Your first sonnet sent me spinning wildly out of control. I loved it! I know that kiss! The 2nd was more challenging to me, emotionally. I'm going to need to live with it a little while before I can comment on it meaningfully. I also l really liked the last one.

I wonder if there are any other brave souls around here who, even if they've not written a sonnet before, are willing to give it a bash just for the sake of this thread?

xoxo

Fflow

You're welcome. I got more, lol. The first one I wrote about a year or so ago, but the second two I wrote this morning. I like playing with the form and trying to spread sentences across lines which I know isn't really kosher, but people do all kinds of things with sonnets so what the heck.

Where's Fool? He writes excellent sonnets. He does.

 

[The_Fool]

You're welcome. I got more, lol. The first one I wrote about a year or so ago, but the second two I wrote this morning. I like playing with the form and trying to spread sentences across lines which I know isn't really kosher, but people do all kinds of things with sonnets so what the heck.

Where's Fool? He writes excellent sonnets. He does.

Sonnets suck. I have to look around and see if I can find anything else. I'm still waiting on Ange to work on that villa-sonnet thingie.

Jester Blues


Iambic Blues

 

[Alex De Kok]

A friend sent me here - so blame her! Anyway, try this for size:

I look back on our life together now,
reflecting on the highs and lows we've shared
in marriage. Many years passed since our vows
but not a single moment would I care
to change. We've shared a love that's filled our life,
old-fashioned though the notion now must seem,
to pass the years together man and wife
in simple peace and domesticity.
And yet we've seen old friends break up and part.
Perhaps they tried too hard and failed to see
that simple things can satisfy the heart.
We see no need to try so hard to be
something we're not. And happy as we are
we realise we're sharing something rare.


Probably tortures the form, rather, but what the heck!

Alex

 

[Lauren Hynde]

A few of mine. I have a preference for Petrarchan.


A Silent Whisper, One Night

Intractable spell, that voice's opiate sigh,
With sounds of gold in nights of doubts umpteen;
By silver sparks, her say reveals a Queen,
She dances naked, lustful - laughs so sly -

A Tigress, tenders me a gleaming thigh,
Intoxicate on Cool, her Beaut pristine,
Bestows her sex and - Oh marvellous scene! -
We spasm together, twin souls soaring high -

But never have I seen her - not a glance! -
Her voice alone commands my heart like this,
I don't desire her flesh, or mere romance -

She's just a voice-in-heat, the quiet ballerina -
And for that voice-turned-real, that Goddess Athena,
I dream to melt away, drown in shivering bliss -


Insomnia: redux

Almost a waning shape, just barely light,
By night, Diana issues her pale glow.
As ends her route above the waves below,
A twin reflects her face quite soft in fright.

Soft subtle murmurs echo through the night.
Within the sleeping lake, cool frogs lay low.
By hoot of owls mens' quiet fears bestow
Between encroaching bushes kept from sight...

With numbing mist, Morfeo takes his toll
So sweet despondency can claim its place
In vain, light hearts thus blessed with loveless soul...

But if I seek enchanted sleep's embrace,
I'm overwhelmed by love and lust's control
And sweetest Kate o'er dreamland gives me chase.

 

[Lauren Hynde]

Sonnet Sluts

I do remember those dear sonnet sluts:
Insatiable in their stern fervent lust,
Demanding penetration, one heavy thrust,
Repeatedly plunged, in their pussies or butts
So indiscriminate they were, the two:
Let any ol' sonnet have its way with them!
No matter how bad, they would never condemn
A well hung sonnet that they'd rather screw.
Remember seeing them, one sunny day,
With sonnet juice all over their smiling faces?
Two cuddled girls, in the park, of all places
Six, seven sonnets, worn out from the play
- That's why I ask, with yearn, but also fear(!):
- Where are those sonnet sluts of yesteryear?

 

[Angeline]

Sonnets suck. I have to look around and see if I can find anything else. I'm still waiting on Ange to work on that villa-sonnet thingie.

Jester Blues


Iambic Blues

Stop being so negative. I know you can write beautiful sonnets. I've seen them. So there!

I forgot about the villa-sonnet thingie. You just want to give me a form challenge so insane that my eyes will cross, lol. And cause you know I'm nutty enough to try to try to write it.

Fflow, there is a wonderful writer at this forum--well not of late, but she shows up now and again by the name of JUDO who writes incredible sonnets. And she can spin them out in minutes and in flawless meter. I saw her do this once and produce a double-acrostic sonnet--acrostic on both the beginning and end letters of each line. Think of that!

 

[champagne1982]

20 minute sonnet...

I find everywhere I look I see
Love's waxy candle burning bright
My heart warmed through by brilliant light
With the welcome melt my love's set free
Come nestle here safe from harm
My joyous kisses smoth'ring your face
Faithful arms hold you in love's embrace
While e'entide's moon works magic's charm
Bewitched, I move through shaded night
Dreaming of orchid-scented hair
Our mated souls, a close-knit pair
Stronger as two when our hearts unite
Together not just you and I but we
One bond, one love, we'll always be.

 

[average gina]

I wonder if there are any other brave souls around here who, even if they've not written a sonnet before, are willing to give it a bash just for the sake of this thread?

xoxo

Fflow[/QUOTE]

Not me, pal... I'm too doopud. Dunno how to kownt dat derr stuf. Anyone got any tutorial links?

 

[BooMerengue]

I wonder if there are any other brave souls around here who, even if they've not written a sonnet before, are willing to give it a bash just for the sake of this thread?

xoxo

Fflow

Not me, pal... I'm too doopud. Dunno how to kownt dat derr stuf. Anyone got any tutorial links?[/QUOTE]

Here is one I like Gina.

WritingWorld.com


I'm sure there are lots of others.

 

[foehn]

I'm sorry, but I'm not particularly impressed by any of these. Somehow, everyone thinks it's okay to write as Shakespeare or Spenser wrote some number of centuries ago, and for me, that isn't the case.

Inversions and skewed diction are taboo, for me. That doesn't mean I'm the final soothsayer in such things, but in Shakespeare's day, the diction was standard. I do understand that in different English-speaking countries (other than the U. S.) the diction can vary, and be different, and nevertheless be ordinary and common. However, I expect writers in other countries to be, by the same token, familiar with questionable phraseology. Deviations from a global norm distract me, and discourage me from reading, and even from considering merit, at times. I know that isn't fair, possibly, but it's a fact.

The rhyme scheme given for the "smack-down" is the English sonnet, which is only one of so many variations. The more you restrict me, the better I do, but I don't think that the Elizabethan, Shakespearian, or English sonnet is particularly relevant to life as we encounter it these days.

I do like form. But more than that I like the *stretching* of form. And so... I'd like a 28, or 18, or even an 8-line sonnet. I know that's weird.

The thing that bothers me the most about the things presented is the inversions of diction. I don't personally believe we can now, as citizens of the 21st century, borrow the diction of 200 years ago, or more. When inversions were common in natural speech, fine. But now, unless you are in Scotland, I find it to be somewhat weird to be putting nouns and verbs and objects in unusual places.

There's a tension between what needs to be said, and what form it needs to take. Some things fit the haiku form, others the rondeau, others the sestina, others the sonnet. Or, at least, those established forms may occur as appropriate avenues of expression for the artist who intends to express something.

And often, with adequate attention, the effort to adhere to form works. The urge to *say* is moulded by the restrictions into eloquence, just as a confession can be extracted through devious means.

However, "form" is artificial. I find excitement in deviation from form, yet adherence to *new* form... at once, an acknowlegement of the importance or the effective measure of form, and a disavowel of allegiance to it. Creativity, in other words, raised to the next power.

Everything has been said, and everything has been rhymed, except "orange," perhaps... In that context, though, there are different ways of trying it again. Some of those ways work. More often than not, they don't. I can hardly abide forced rhymes, and inverted diction in order to accomodate rhyme. I try to make a distinction or two between modern diction and the diction of some century passed.

For example, one of my favorite pieces of verse is "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" by W. B. Yeats. The rhythm and meter seem to be horrible, by the standards I know, for a rhyming poem. Yet, it's from a land whose diction I'm less familiar with, and it was written over 100 years ago.

I believe that what we write, if we wish to reach the high road, needs to sound natural, or close to natural. It's no longer possible to write Shakespeare or Yeats, or John Donne, or Keats. It's not even possible to write Frost, any longer.

Coming back then, to the question of sonnets, I adore the valiant efforts at duplicating the form in natural, contemporary speech. But when it's not natural, I find it irritating, as that seems to be evidence that form has controlled the saying, rather than saying and form meshing in a synergistic manner.

I am, of course, pre-conditioned to be more receptive to the natural, modern diction of modern speech in the U. S. That's not my fault. This is where I was born and grew up. I try to be aware of differences between this country and other English-speaking countries, but am not very studied in that.

Then again, my tastes don't determine the tastes of the world-at-large. I'm not haughty; it's just that there are some things I can't hold against whatever dim light I have for judging good modern poetry without finding them too faint to admire.

It's not easy to write anything against a strict form, especially one with other conditions added, which were likely "given" conditions in the past. I do like form very much. It raises me, I feel, to new heights sometimes. But my main allegiance is to creativity and the exact thing I want to express.


~~

HOW TO HELP EACH OTHER UP


She’s sitting in the rocking chair that swivels
slightly with her breathing which resembles the bright
counterpoint to sight of cloud and gravel
during some noon slightly hotter than this night
in this house, fans all blending sultry air,
and she’s looking over her book at you on the floor
worn out by a less-than-two-year-old, and there
she’s seeing herself with your own eyes, with your
charm and grace, your manner of ownership.
Or so you imagine; that she sees the equivalence
of height and depth as you extend hands and grip
and pull and each rise to an aligned balance
in which oppression is forgotten, as iron filings forget
their weight sometimes, in response to a magnet.


(Kansas Quarterly)

 

[Fflow]

Wow!

Well, I have to say that I'm very pleased by all the response to this thread.

I agree with Foehn about the reliance on archaic sentance structure or, more honestly, forcing words to fit the sonnet structure. I know I'm guilty of this and, if I were a better poet, or had taken more time with my work, I would have avoided this pitfall. Still, such things do not these works invalidate.

I have to admit that I almost did a full spit-take, destroying my computer keyboard, when reading Lauren's submission, Sonnet Sluts. Shee-it, girl! That was great!

I hope more folks jump onto the bandwagon and give sonnet-writing a bash.

xoox

fflow

 

[The Mutt]

I love sonnets. This is the first one I ever wrote. A college english teacher dared me.


To Roxanne

Around the courtyard, brown leaves chase their tails,
The ivy-strangled walls are stone and high,
Within, the virgin weeps as sunlight fails,
And nuns, like sparrows, tend her every sigh.
A maiden forty years, and maiden still,
An icy heart that sunning never warms,
Yet faithful to a love time cannot kill,
She mourns the man who twice died in her arms;
The young cadet, whose beauty stormed her gate,
The poet shy, whose face the night concealed,
Oh handsome lad, your protest came too late,
Too late, oh bard, when your truth was revealed.
And so she sits, lamenting wasted years,
Re-reading letters stained with blood and tears.

 

[foehn]

Still, such things do not these works invalidate.

LOL! True!

 

[Angeline]

Well, I have to say that I'm very pleased by all the response to this thread.

I agree with Foehn about the reliance on archaic sentance structure or, more honestly, forcing words to fit the sonnet structure. I know I'm guilty of this and, if I were a better poet, or had taken more time with my work, I would have avoided this pitfall. Still, such things do not these works invalidate.

I have to admit that I almost did a full spit-take, destroying my computer keyboard, when reading Lauren's submission, Sonnet Sluts. Shee-it, girl! That was great!

I hope more folks jump onto the bandwagon and give sonnet-writing a bash.

xoox

fflow

Hey, I didn't force words to fit the structure in the second and third ones I posted! And I like archaic and modern structuring; if a poem is good, it can be written however it's written, though I know everyone from Sylvia Plath to Pablo Neruda to Ted Berrigan have written wonderful nontraditional sonnets. This by the way is a very cool sonnet site:

Sonnet Central.

 

[Lauren Hynde]

My favourite of my sonnets is a non-traditional one, although still maintaining all the defining characteristics of a sonnet:


Last Sonnet

I take this chaos
for my home

desertion of hands
shaped as grenades

lips lighter than day
resisting steal's temper

animal communion
in mechanical glades

sweat grown into rivers
in the edge of parched eyes

dry lips revisit
of inner peace

tomorrow, I'll drink sun
where tonight - dust.​

 

[Angeline]

My favourite of my sonnets is a non-traditional one, although still maintaining all the defining characteristics of a sonnet:


Last Sonnet

I take this chaos
for my home

desertion of hands
shaped as grenades

lips lighter than day
resisting steal's temper

animal communion
in mechanical glades

sweat grown into rivers
in the edge of parched eyes

dry lips revisit
of inner peace

tomorrow, I'll drink sun
where tonight - dust.​

You're brilliant. I know I tell you all the time, but really you are.

 

[Fflow]

Lauren - You da bomb!

That one gave me goosebumps! Thanks!

fflow

 

[BooMerengue]

Heres one Lauren made me write...

HyperSleep


This body has for so long been a tomb
so dark and cold; no place for life to spring
awake, and yet your hands begin to sing
and chase away the comfort of the gloom.

The light pours in and basking in its glow
this corpse does rise enrapt in your romance;
allows your song to lead me through the dance
to wash away the shroud that holds me low.

Then as we dance the Stars put on a show
The Sun and Moon competing for our glance
for in this Universe we reign supreme!

Yet now this heart, alive again, does grow
and quickly do I spin into your trance!
So happily I miss your dark eyed gleam

While demon like you reached into my womb
with lips so cold my soul becomes a thing
to shatter as my ears begin to ring
and now your song changes to one of doom.

Enshrouded once again in death I seem
to once again be plagued by foolish dream. ​

just kidding, Lauren.

 

[Fflow]

Damb, Boo!

That was really lovely... For some sick reason I wanted to read "stinking corpse" but that's just me...

Great work! I'm so glad this thread has blossomed!

xoxo

fflow

 

[Miss Oatlash]

Might I submit one of my own?
Tears of Desire