Oct 16, 2015 Original Poetry, Writing 201

Immortality, OR:  Art Causes Pain and Pleasure

©October 16th, 2015

By Vijaya Sundaram

It’s You of whom (sometimes) I think when I

See people work at art or song or verse

While making beauty with their minds, traverse

The lands invisible that touch the sky.

 

Your shadows lurk so menacingly stark

For ’tis a place of light and shade, this land

Where dreamers, poets, artists, singers band;

In vain, we seek our songs in brooding dark

 

We seek You, Immortality, and roam,

Our paintbrush, flute, guitar or pen in hand

And (vagabonds so far away from home),

We spread across these vast, uncharted lands

And hacking ‘cross the tangled brush, we come*

To You, whom now, at last, we understand.

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*Okay, so I took some liberty with the rhyme there, don’t razz me!

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Our Day 10 (FINAL DAY!)’s prompt was: Write a Sonnet, about pleasure, using Apostrophe as your device.

Our esteemed host and Muse @benhuberman had this parting gem:

If you happen to be one of those who find sonnets easy, have no fear — you can still challenge yourself further. How about going for a crown of sonnets? Or branching out to the sestina, another structurally difficult form?

I’ll have my readers know that this sonnet (my first, my first!), which took me TWO FULL hours exactly, I used a Petrachan sonnet form, with a couple of exceptions.  So, instead of abba, abba, cd, cd, cd rhyme scheme, I used an abba, cddc, ed, ed, ed rhyme scheme.  I also tried, desperately, to use iambic pentameter, reading it aloud to myself as it went, tweaking a word here, or rearranging some words there.

Note:  There is another Petrarchan form is abba, abba, cde, cde, which I did not even want to attempt.

(Now, I shall go and lick my wounds, and sorrow over my terrible poem!)

Hats off to those who can do a “Crown” of Sonnets, and Sestinas, to boot!  (I’m thinking of you, Melinda Kucsera!)

Anyway, I’m done.

And no, I’m NOT going to attempt a Sestina today.  Too much else going on in my life, and writing a meaningful Sestina will take up more time, no doubt.

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Tags: #Immortality, #Pleasure, #sonnet, #Writing 201, Art, Artists, Final Day, Pain, Seekers, uncharted lands, vagabonds