Showing posts with label sonnets. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sonnets. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

A Haiku and a Sonnet

Today, I'm doing a double poem post.

First, the Haiku.  February is the month of the Haiku-a-thon!  Few Miles is a site which actively encourages poets to write twenty-eight haiku during February - one for each day of the month. 

Image courtesy Krazykk's Weblog


Contemplating snow.
No plans to shovel it; just
contemplating. Snow.






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Second, the Sonnet.  Poetic Asides is currently running their Sonnet Challenge. If you are a Sonnet person, you really should give it a try!  Now, in addition to that, Magpie Tales offered up the photograph below as a writing prompt for this week.  I wrote a Pushkin Sonnet utilizing both sites as my twin inspirations.

Cobbled Bricks

I gingerly tread on old cobbled bricks
which pave the roadway to dark parts, unknown.
I seek Charon to navigate this Styx
but friendless am I on brick-laden stone.
Which door will lead to the warmth of the hearth?
Which door will lead to the chill of a Swarth*?
Crossing these cobbles and bricks bring me fear.
All that surrounds me is cold and austere.
I take but a step, and then look around.
Nothing’s familiar and nothing feels close
except for dread on a scale grandiose;
except for ghosts of the dead that abound.
And then, when all hope has vanished – a light.
It beckons me home, to end this drear night.

(* According to Webster's Dictionary, 1913, one definition of a 'Swarth' is an apparition of a person about to die; a wraith.)

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Saturday, January 15, 2011

Sonnet XX!!!

Photographic image courtesy of Miss_Robot
Today, Writer's Island gave the prompt of "Courage."

Yesterday, Poetic Asides posted an informative discussion on the subject of the poetic form, sonnet.

I decided to try and combine the two for my post today.

So, the first thing I did was Google  - sorry...I know, it's a banned, trite word, but necessary, nonetheless - 'Shakespearean sonnets about courage.' From the results, I chose one sonnet in particular (Sonnet XXIII) which I thought might work (with a bit of tweaking here and there) with a couple of quotes I found when I also Googled 'humorous courage quotes'.

Sonnet XX!!!

I'm not funny.  What I am is brave.  ~Lucille Ball

Read what my medal says: "Courage". Ain't it the truth? Ain't it the truth? ~The Cowardly Lion

As an unperfect actor on life’s stage,
I sometimes fear I’ve forgotten my part.,
Where is the green room?  Can I disengage
myself from the scene?  I need a kick start.
So I think of those things that I must say
even if difficult, to make it right.
And in that moment, my fears go away
and then I know I’ve conquered my stage fright.
The Cowardly Lion and Lucille Ball
each found courage with a word or a deed.
It’s not yet time for the last curtain call
so I have to 'just do it' to succeed.
   Even if nerve has departed, forsooth,         
   I can be courageous.  Ain’t it the truth.

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