Poetry

I love poetry. I like reading it but I love writing it. It reminds me of a puzzle. You have to manipulate language and words to accommodate the technical aspects of poetry. So you just have to find the right piece that fits. It has to evoke a feeling and you can really lay your soul out on a page. It's awesome.

Daughter #1 came home this week with an assignment. They have been studying poetry in Language Arts. Her assignment was to write a Iambic Pentametre Poem.... in layman's terms she had to write a Sonnet. I remember studying prose and drama in school and I remember reading poetry but quite frankly, I never was taught the finer aspects of poetry. (I must have missed school that day/week)! As most of you know I play with poetry. I love writing rhymes and I love free style poetry where there are no rules but as the Daughters learn more about the technical side of poetry, so too do I.

Daughter #1 was in a pickle... she had been studying for exams all week and I think her brain was fried. She knew what she had to do but doing it was just not coming. I realize that writing poetry is not for everyone.... it's rather a bit like opera... either you like it or you don't. Daughter #1 is not a puzzle person. It makes her frustrated to try to fit those pieces into the right place so writing an Iambic Pentametre poem was not sitting well with her and that was her assignment on Thursday night. Write an Iambic Pentametre poem and pass it in on Friday. When she hit tears I knew I had to help. So together we got down to it. She explained to me what an Iambic Pentametre poem is (the technical side) and said that Shakespeare was the most famous for Sonnets.... aahhh, yes in the dredges of my memory I remembered my Shakespeare book had many of his sonnets and so out came the Shakespeare book so that I could read some of his before trying to help Daughter #1 with one. An Iambic Pentametre poem has to have 10 syllables in each line with the emphasis on every second syllable, there have to be 14 lines and every second line has to rhyme, with the last two rhyming too. This is the simple version of what a Sonnet is. Finally we felt we were ready and so we got down to it. Here is what we wrote...

The Sonnet Sonnet

In truth, there is no joy in bad sonnets.
I loathe the master of these dreadful rhymes.
Without my Mom, I could have not done it,
And write a verse like those of ancient times.
This is a sad and most horrific task,
With which to torture students and their brains.
How can we hope to prove our minds, I ask?
Our minds are just a bunch of crude remains.
So here I sit and waste my youthful years,
To try and write a useless, stupid rhyme,
When life around me begs for joy, not tears,
And asks me to enjoy these golden times.
I ask you not to teach this loathsome stuff.
It makes me want to scream and huff and puff.

I am sitting with a grin.... I hope her teacher gets it.... but I'm not sure he will... still, I can't see how we could be more obvious.... we would have to hit him over the head with a club.

Anyway, since Daughter #1 and I wrote that poem... well, Sonnets have been on my mind... I love to play with words and so I tried one out of my own...so if you are a poetry buff.... or you're just curious... check out the Sonnet that I wrote in Feathermist.....my other blog.