April Poetry Challenge 2021: Day Twelve

 

Day 12 Prompt: Six Words (convict, great, play, race, season, and voice)

Form: Sestina

“Messed up the Lines”

The gavel came down hard. He was convicted

of all the things he did, small and great.

He was silent, he had no lines for this play.

He was too tired from the race

he had been running for 200 seasons.

He only wished he could hear her voice 

one last time. His name plus her voice 

arrested his heart. Love convicted

him during a winter season

many years ago. She lead him to great

heights on paths they walked while others raced 

by them. Building a new stage, they wrote a new play.

A supporting cast ad-libbed lines during the play, 

but moved on as they found their own voice. 

Time kept the pace for the race

they ran together. Her love convicted 

his heart with joy, but all the great 

stories have a dark season.

It wasn’t Love’s fault, new seasons 

are built from the past, the play

between memories and questions are great 

forces that bellow a devastating voice

that splinters stages. The conviction 

of not enough led him on a spirit filled race. 

There is no string at the end of a race 

to empty the bottles with icons of seasons 

on the label. No conviction

of the soul can out play 

the way shot glasses change a man’s voice. 

He learned that all can fall from great

heights. How he missed the great

room they would sit in after a day’s race.

Her hands warm in his, her voice 

seductive like a spring season.

They would watch life play 

out before them. Together convicted.

He hangs his head, convicted of great

and small lines in a play he would race 

back to the debut season to hear her voice.

Poetic Form 100: Glosa

 Why Write Poetry

Whenever the question comes up,

the poets all say the same thing:

the only poem we’re interested in is the next poem,

the one not written, the poem of tomorrow.

“The Next Poem” - Billy Collins

I have read that poetry is not needed.

That the world will revolve without words

that rhyme or follow meter.

This might be true

for a life void of crayons,

or animals made with dixie cups,

glue, and construction paper.

I reply that poetry is in a child’s song,

in tears of a lifetime breakup,

whenever the question comes up.

All art draws a line for our souls.

Bringing the unimaginable

from abstract to concrete,

to keep us from drowning

in a sea filled with waves

caused by life, by everything.

A brush, a guitar string, or these

words I search for to create a moment

for the reader to take wing.

The poets all say the same thing.

A poem is a present we send

to an unexpected world not knowing

if anyone will appreciate the 

painting inside the paper and bow.

Every word a small piece of truth

to inspire the lonesome,

the joyful, and the budding artist.

Poets write to stitch the fabric of living

for the pages of history. It’s known

the only poem we’re interested in is the next poem.

So, take these lines at this time

as a chance to see the frame

of a life lived, no matter how far away

from the emotions pulsing through

your veins. Grab a brush, a pair of scissors,

tap a tune that defines the depth of woe.

The world will turn, no matter what art is not created.

But the colors and emotions will be faded. 

I’ll be living, feeling the edges of a new rhyme though,

the one not written, the poem of tomorrow.

Poetic Form #100: Glosa

The Glosa or Glose is a Spanish poetic form that uses a quatrain from another 

poet’s work to structure the poet’s poem.

The form guidelines are:

1. A cabeza (or motto) – the quatrain borrowed from another poet, whose 

authorship must be acknowledged

2. Four 10-line stanzas, each ending with one of the lines in sequence from the cabeza.

3. The rhyme-scheme requirement is lines 6 and 9 rhyme with the final word of line 10 

of each stanza.

Poetic form 22: Palindrome

Tomorrow?

Today feels rough,

hate runs doubt.

Mouths filled with

painted lines to divide.

Fences or shields, only

questions drop;

can we

love?

We can.

Drop questions.

Only shields or fences

divide to lines painted

with filled mouths.

Doubt runs hate

rough; feels today.

Poetic Form #22: Palindrome

A palindrome poem has a few variations but the basic idea is to use the same words in the first 
half of the poem as the second half with a central word to flip the poem at.