Thursday, March 27, 2008

Poetry Friday: The Villanelle

Here's an interesting exercise: write a 19 line poem with just two rhyming sounds, and in which about a third of the lines are refrains. The first stanza haunts every other -- its first and third lines alternating as conclusions to the stanzas that follow, until they come together to end the poem as a couplet. Do that and you will have created something called a "villanelle."

Below I've included a) a great villanelle by Theodore Roethke and b) my own attempt at the form. If you're inspired to try your own hand at this, please feel free to post the result as a comment to this post. (It's a very fun excercise; learn more about the villanelle and how to write one here; for another famous example, see Dylan Thomas' Do not go gentle into that good night).

The Waking
by Theodore Roethke

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.

We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Of those so close beside me, which are you?
God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
And learn by going where I have to go.

Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?
The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Great Nature has another thing to do
To you and me; so take the lively air,
And, lovely, learn by going where to go.

This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.

Villanelle Expirans
by Wes

There is one small thing I would have you do
Don't let me down when I look up and say:
"Know I would only ask it of a few"

Never did I deny your silent moods
The time it took all evening to hear:
"There is one small thing I would have you do"

So leave me lying here when I am due
Don't lift me up when I lay down at last
Know I would only ask it of a few

Leaning is taking, the world gives me its hue
My debt called up sings this familiar tune:
"There is one small thing I would have you do."

I held the world dear even in its ruin
Tell morning this with hands wedged into time
Know I would only ask it of a few

The night's last hour on the budding dew
Leans down and waits to feel my arching soul
There is one small thing I would have you do
Know I would only ask it of a few.



Visit the rest of the Poetry Friday roundup at Cuentecitos today!

9 comments:

  1. here's one by Sylvia Plath

    Lament
    The sting of bees took away my father
    who walked in a swarming shroud of wings
    and scorned the tick of the falling weather.

    Lightning licked in a yellow lather
    but missed the mark with snaking fangs:
    the sting of bees too away my father.

    Trouncing the sea like a ragin bather,
    he rode the flood in a pride of prongs
    and scorned the tick of the falling weather.

    A scowl of sun struck down my mother,
    tolling her grave with golden gongs,
    but the sting of bees took away my father.

    He counted the guns of god a bother,
    laughed at the ambush of angels’ tongues,
    and scorned the tick of the falling weather.

    O ransack the four winds and find another
    man who can mangle the grin of kings:
    the sting of bees took away my father
    who scorned the tick of the falling weather.

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  2. I haven't gotten the trick of this form yet; thanks for the challenge. I will have to wrestle a while...

    Loved your selections!

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  3. Wes! I applaud you. The villanelle is a strict mistress, and she's very, very hard to keep pace with, and yet you've managed it brilliantly.

    I've written one to date, and it sucks. Hard. Plath wrote a number of them, and made them seem easy, even, but she went mad in the end and killed herself. I'm not saying it was the villanelles that did it; I'm just saying that they could make one mad.

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  4. Kelly -- thank you, I really appreciate that!

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  5. Cloudscome-good luck with your villanelle; looking forward to seeing what you come up with!

    Kelly-I think you may be onto something. The thought of writing a villanelle makes me want to put my head in a gas stove.

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  6. Hope you post yours here Cloudscome.

    Jill, the thought of putting your head in a gas stove would be a great subject for a villanelle--a tribute to Silvia.

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  8. Jill -- I couldn't resist writing the tribute myself. I noticed that my Villanelle Expirans isn't true to the form -- the middle lines are supposed to rhyme; so I thought I'd try again.

    Silvanellia Plath

    Write a villanelle? I’d rather hide my head
    And put to sleep unwanted thought
    In a gas stove or feathered bed

    Its repetition turns me into lead
    Framed in the stanchions of its taunt
    Write a villanelle? I’d rather hide my head

    Nineteen lines and just two rhymes are fed
    A double refrain that makes my mind its haunt
    Its gas stove, or perhaps its feathered bed

    The villanelle is made to haunt the dead
    And remind them of the ways in which they offed
    The villanelles once hidden in their heads

    I’m carefully looking over what I’ve said
    Fowl or fair it’s plucked from what I caught
    For a gas stove or feathered bed

    I’m leaving now, I do it with some dread
    It’s not because I enjoyed this a lot
    Write a villanelle? I’d rather hide my head
    In a gas stove (forget about the bed)

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  9. Wes,
    Love it! Love it! Love it!

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