Poet's Prep School #2

[Alaeha]

Just slightly off-center in the main portion of the Carnival, Alaeha set up a small tent. It was blue, of course. (What other color could it be?) Pale blue -- almost periwinkle -- with a deep royal blue trim. Money had not been a concern, so she had found the perfect tent.

 

Inside, she placed a small, nicely carved desk and chair. She had no idea what manner of wood it was, but it was good enough for her purposes. In the corner of the desk, she set a jar of geld, and in the center a stack of parchments with a quill, some ink, a box of pins, and a whittling knife for the quill -- just in case.

 

Looking at the modest, clay jar, she laughed softly to herself. How many people would be zapped for trying to take more than they earned?

 

With a soft whisper of thanks to Peredhil for enchanting the jar to ensure honesty, (she had persuaded him on the grounds that dishonesty was Rude, and theft even moreso,) she sat, and began writing.

 

Those intending to enter the contests the AAA holds later on will be expected to be adept at writing in Iambic Pentameter. For those unfamiliar with poetic terms, this means that each line will be exactly ten syllables long, with emphasis placed on the second, fourth, sixth, eighth, and tenth.

 

An Iamb is a two syllable unit of measure in which the first syllable in stressed; it is not to be confused with a trochee (two syllables with emphasis on the first,) spondee (two stressed/emphasized syllables,) dactyl (one stressed syllable followed by two unstressed,) or an anapest (a reversed dactyl.)

 

The term Pentameter means that there are five Iambs in each line. Iambic Pentameter means Five Iambs. Starting with two unit lines, the terms are Dimeter, Trimeter, Tetrameter, Pentameter, Hexameter; there are some other terms I can't remember offhand. They're irrelevant in this case, though, as that covers two through six.

 

My challenge to those reading this is simple. Use the spare parchment to write fourteen lines of poetry in Iambic Pentameter. It can rhyme or be rhymeless, it makes no difference to me. You may write another 14 line poem if you wish, but you will only be able to take Geld for two poems.

 

Good luck!

 

~Alaeha

 

Alaeha read over her notes, and nodded to herself. They should be clear enough. If not, she was sure someone would find her and ask questions.

 

As she left, she wondered just how effective the shock would be at keeping Wyvern out. It would be good enough. That was certain.

[Peredhil]

Guido stops and reads the rules. Carefully reaching out, he turns the parchment upsidedown and tries again.

 

Yo a-lady. Do youse t'ink youse could maybe give a sample line wit' markings for da stress-impaired?

[Alaeha]

Alaeha looked back and saw Guido struggling with her instructions. At his request, she blushed slightly. Of course, she should have done that in the first place.

 

"I'm sorry. I intended to do that, but I must have forgotten. Just a moment."

 

She thought for a moment, and wrote a postscript to her notes.

 

PS: My apologies for not including this in the main body. The following are a pair of lines like the ones I'm asking for, with lines under the stressed syllables.

 

"Tonight I hope my man will take me out

to see the sights, and all the rides, as well."

 

Fighting her blush back down, she handed the parchment and quill back to Guido. "That should help."

[Yuki Kokoro]

Some of the stressed syllables in these are forced, but if they can be read as Iambic Pentameter is it still acceptable?

 

Anyway, I felt like a challenge tonight so here are my two tries at a sonnet:

 

 

I throw my towel in and throw up walls

As life becomes too much for me some days,

My trust and hope in those around me palls

If just because I cannot open up

To joy and love and all life’s mysteries.

My fear of hurting others; being hurt,

My nervousness at new things going wrong,

Will cripple me for life unless I jump

Headlong into the things that scared me once.

Though means I risk my life and limb to throngs

Of strangers pushing me all different ways,

Continued happiness must mean new change.

But how can one work past the fear life brings

Having been hurt by many different things?

 

~~~~~~~

 

This one doubles as an answer to the challenge Finnius put forth in this thread and there you will find the other version before I finished smashing it into sonnet form and taking it even further from the original.

 

Belief in love, belief in fate, belief

That debts cannot be paid by anyone

Surely not me, made blind by debt’s debris

I stumble, and remorse makes my heart scream.

Distraught I long for love's music now gone

In search of better ears not drown in beats

As mine hear everything, my heart and yours.

I think and sigh for days they’d beat in time

But though I once thought two would always twine

Time now has torn them both apart and I

Can only wish for days once Heaven-sent.

It pains me so that our love could not be

For though it seems that I was wrong for you

You always felt so truly right for me.

 

 

P.S. - Other people should give this a go! Stretch your poetic muscles!

[Ayshela]

i wish sometimes that i could see through time,

across the many years that intervene -

to see the choices which i had to make

and all the options that i hadn't seen.

Perhaps my life would be much better now

if any of the choices had been made

in quite a different way, or other time

than how they were, because it's all i saw.

And maybe yet it only would be changed,

not better, only different somehow.

Perhaps the changes would be for the worse

and i would miss so much that i have now.

Perhaps it's just as well that i can't see

the options which would make a different me.

[Quincunx]

Tarot

 

Yes! True, my lord, the deck can cut both ways,

It's sharpened twice, a cold judicial sword

Now pointed at those traitors and their siege,

As you have come to gloatingly foresee,

For you are here, and just as blind as me--

no, we're not equal--it's a turn of phrase--

my fingers slipped, the deck has flipped--my lord,

that's not the card I meant to draw, my liege!

(I preened him with a different card in hand,

can't bear to look--what landed up, instead?

I've done this for three lords and twenty years

and it was never lawful in this land.

I've seen their righteous deaths on rebel spears

but said it not, and now they'll spear my head.)

[Quincunx]

So young to know the dirt this world can drum

up, most of it now smeared on all her skin,

and ribbon flowers stuffed with sandwich crumbs,

a buttered nose, and milk upon her chin.

 

The jelly-flesh, confined by denim jeans,

is tensed like water droplets at the waist,

low waist, high shirt, and trembling between,

the water ripples--will you have a taste?

 

Eight wrinkles chopped where smiles used to be,

the bust is waisted, hair has gone to seed

and floated off, one artificial knee,

and fingers stained from pulling every weed.

 

Photographers walked past in hot pursuit

of perfect girls; their senses weren't acute.

[cryptomancer]

Would I not know the soft caress of your

Sweet lips upon my brow or your embrace

Around my form, in the dreamless decay

Of all, that in my life I see. Can I

Never find you, in the cold despair that

Life gave my world? Is the warm heart’s soft beat

Too full, to love me still? Am I too lost

Without her kiss? Is the despair a dream?

Is life a charmed device that holds my soul?

How can I stay? How can I leave? But in

My love I heal again. Forming the soft

Sweet words of love and in her heart begin

Again, to live and breath, alive and free,

To fly my dream and love, her heart freely.

 

 

[Peredhil]

Waddding up yet another sheet of paper, Peredhil petulantly throws it at the waste basket, where it hits the rim and bounces off onto the floor.

He glares at it for a few moments, then sighs and gets up and carefully puts it into the trash so no one will feel they have to clean up after him.

Picking up his quill, he gnaws on the end and sighs.

Guido walks in.

 

"Yo Boss, how dey hangin'?"

"Not well, not well at all. I can't seem to get this syllable stresses thing down. "

"Well, whatsa prob?"

"You see, there are certain syllables which are pronounced stressed, and others softer in speech. I can't seem to hear them to do these strictured poems."

"E'er t'ink it might be 'cause youse talks funny? 'I caunt seem to he-yah dem ta doo deese strrrrrictur-ed poh-emmms.' Maybe if'n youse didn't conversate likes a cross 'tween William Shatner and Peter O'Toole, youse'd have a better try." He looked at Peredhil's face. "uh... Boss."

"Do you really think that could be it? It's hard enough not to sing. This tongue is so atonal. Even Mandarin has three pitches for words. I must muse on this. Thank you my friend."

 

After standing and hugging Guido, he strides from the writing chamber deeply in thought.

 

"Great guy, but he sure conversates funny."