A limerick seems a good size fer
Citations to make a man wiser;
The sonnet's a bother,
And makes of the author
A lexicographical miser.

Posted July 29, 2008 12:09 PM by Josh Millard

It's quite a magnificent sight
and surely took long to indite,
but seems somehow wrong
to use such a strong
form of verse without preventive rite.

Posted July 29, 2008 12:21 PM by Fragano Ledgister

Josh @1:

A sonnet may be useful to define
More complex terms, when subtle, nuanced use
Makes limerick-based treatment far too loose:
The meaning can be shaded, line on line,
For fourteen measured phrases, stressed like speech.
(Do not discount the ease its meter gives!
It's by its rhythm that a sonnet lives
And breathes, and can be made to teach.)
Admittedly a simpler verse in form
Presents a lower threshold to surmount.
It is a large endeavor; numbers count!
And when the rules are tough, too few conform.
But I would still from sonnets, in their grace,
Research my words, if there were such a place.

Posted July 29, 2008 12:51 PM by abi

A couplet for me is quite ample
as the means to define a sample

Posted July 29, 2008 1:00 PM by Terry Karney

abi's point taken
yet line eight an iamb short
rebuttal haiku

Posted July 29, 2008 1:10 PM by Josh Millard

That was clumsy:

A couplet for me is quite ample
as the means for defining a sample

Posted July 29, 2008 1:18 PM by Terry Karney

This is just to say

I have omitted
the word
that came fourth in
my eighth line

and which
you were probably
missing
when you read it

Forgive me
it was "even":
a trochee
not an iamb.

Posted July 29, 2008 1:22 PM by abi

To poets of the first water
they come like iambs to the slaughter.

Posted July 29, 2008 1:24 PM by elise

Terry @6:
Pangere de verbo sat certe distichon unum
Tangere rem si vis calliditatis acu.

Posted July 29, 2008 1:36 PM by Marc Moskowitz

Higgledy piggledy
Our Fluorospherians
illustrate word meanings
forsaking prose

What lexicographical
versificational
redefinitional
lines they compose!

Posted July 29, 2008 1:45 PM by John Mark Ockerbloom

If at times I seem outclassed
by poets writing finer verse
I come up with some rhyming fast
and turn it into lyrics, first.

It may not be melodic, true,
But at least I find a rhyme;
It is the least that I can do—
excuse me, diaper-changing time.

Posted July 29, 2008 2:01 PM by B. Durbin

I have no need of trochee;
Hairs are split in twain.
The metrical distinction I disdain.

Iamb a rock.
Iamb an island.

Posted July 29, 2008 2:04 PM by Josh Millard

I think I will be in hell
ere I finish my first villanelle
recyclable lines
don't come to my mind
and my command of meter isn't swell

Posted July 29, 2008 2:12 PM by Tania

Now Tania, please let us leaven
You disparagement set at eleven.
With practice it's faster.
And in case of disaster
Remember you might go to heaven.

Posted July 29, 2008 2:16 PM by abi

Making Light's moderator, Abi
Wrote a sonnet with missing syllabi.
Iamb totally amazed to see
That she claimed an errant trochee.

Posted July 29, 2008 2:18 PM by Ginger

Wise is the Light-Crafter who, watching the wordplay,
The careful twisting and turning of terms
Into finely-wrought riddles and rhymes of distinction,
Forbears to put forth his (or her) own footling phrases . . .
But wisdom, alas!, for me is oft wanting.

Posted July 29, 2008 3:01 PM by Debra Doyle

Blood pressures were rising, and moderates fled
discussions retired, while others grew hot
some vowels went missing in one parting shot
So abi created a poetry thread!

Some threads are for chatting, and some for a fight
some posts are for boasting of trolls that you beat
today we could do with a bit less of heat
So how 'bout we go back to making some light?

Posted July 29, 2008 3:57 PM by albatross

albatross @17:
That didn't go where, from the first line, I thought it was going to. I was expecting something more like:

Blood pressures are rising - the mood is getting low
Fluorosphere tells us, this thread's the place to go
And reminds us again here:
Tell it all over the site
Enough of the heat, now
It's time to start making light!

Let's make some light, hallelujah!
Let's make some light, amen!
We've gotta frolic until we start
Laughing fit to fall apart!
Let's make some light, hallelujah!
Let's make some light! Every thread onsite!
Truth, mercy, quips and verse,
Language, cooking, puns and worse!

Posted July 29, 2008 4:47 PM by abi

The sonnet-scop Sutherland, sweet-spoken word-smith
who guards the grey halls where oft the fen gather
called then a contest, as was commonly done there,
for vying in verse - and to the victor, long glory,
their poetry preserved by the power of “View all by”.

Now rose the noob, knees knocking together,
pronouncing what, truly, was her first proper prosody...
be gentle, it's my first time.

Posted July 29, 2008 4:56 PM by Tlönista

Sun's light replaces darkness at the dawn,
relinquishes its place again at dusk.
The stars send down reminder, but a husk
of brilliance cross the light-years drawn.
The field equations show that light rides space,
its forces constantly reversing roles,
but, just as true, a flood of photons rolls,
carrying insight at the fastest pace.
Illumining our minds is what we say
about our apprehensions of the world.
The grasp we take on life as we are hurled
through sights we'd savor, and yet cannot stay.
More meanings light may have for us to take;
We'll find them at the place where light we make.

Posted July 29, 2008 5:29 PM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

Old verse-forms
A Doyle jumps in
The sound of a delighted Lioness

Posted July 29, 2008 5:54 PM by elise

The task, we find, is never to set straight
those who come limping to the summer feast
in search of all the savours we released;

we do not snarl or tell them they are late,
their style and manner we have not policed.
The task we find is never to set straight.

Rather our duty's to keep wide the gate
and grant full favour even to the least,
admitting all until the night has ceased.
The task we find is never to set straight.

Posted July 29, 2008 8:00 PM by Fragano Ledgister

abi #18:

Somehow, I keep trying to fit that TTTO the wrong song.

It's confounding;
Patience fleeting;
Flamage takes its toll.
But read it closely...
Till they spawn a new thread.
I've got to keep control.

I remember losing my vowels
Flaming those posters when
The trolls would hit me
and the snark would be calling....

Let's do the vowel-warp again!
Let's do the vowel-warp again!

Posted July 29, 2008 8:02 PM by albatross

"Beware the Weblog Mod, my Son, the flame delete, the troll-post catch,
beware the SysAdmin and shun, the frumrious Vowel Snatch."

Posted July 29, 2008 9:01 PM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

For the mod was a boojum, you see.

Posted July 29, 2008 9:43 PM by TexAnne

/snark

Posted July 29, 2008 10:27 PM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

Sing! O mod, the rage of OED
Son of Murray, at vile
Seizure of venerated role.
Many lov'd words were sent
Into the maw of low lyric,
Their meaning prey to Evil
Pun and base Rhyme.

Posted July 29, 2008 10:38 PM by JimR

abi - though trochee,
placed before "can," "even" makes
line 8 all iamb

Posted July 29, 2008 11:35 PM by wanderer

musclebound poet
chews greens and defends his art
"iamb what iamb"

Posted July 30, 2008 12:05 AM by Josh Millard

[The good parts of this were stolen from Kipling, but I supplied the bad parts myself.]

When in the net's designs diverse,
Our endless chat began,
The sharpest snark, the quickest curse,
Gave man control of man;


'Till, tired of flames and argument,
And fearful of dog piles,
Away were the offenders sent,
Into the deep kill-files.


So snark and curse were dulled a bit
As ways your foe to slam
'till some ingenious con man hit
upon the curse of spam.


Then killfiles became useless rigs,
The spammers' spew flew loose,
As emails hid in cluttered sigs,
And spam fought cancel-moose.


In time the chatters moved around,
and usenet fell to trolls.
Discussions in the comments found,
in bloggers' comment rolls.


A thousand flowers tried to bloom,
and most were killed by spam,
by trolls and griefers bringing doom,
and con men with a scam


But the survivors' mods were fleet,
and threw not in their towels,
and predators who came to eat,
departed missing vowels.

Posted July 30, 2008 12:25 AM by albatross

abi wondered: is there
A website out there
Doing much of the same for the sonnet?

You'd think so, wouldn't you? But no. I've looked,
But so far found no sites that fit the bill.
The closest yet is not a site, but just
A single sample on a single page:

I once loved a lassie from Greenleigh
Whose comportment was naught short of queenly.
When she grows old and stout,
Wracked with chilblains and gout,
I'll embrace her no less, but more keenly.

(http://www.avantnews.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=254)

(This isn't what you meant, but you'll concede
A site of these would be good too. Agreed?)

Posted July 30, 2008 12:42 AM by Paul A.

When that I was and a little tiny n00b
With an A, E, and I and an O
My japing marked me but a boob
And a U and even sometimes Y

But when I came to keep a blog
With an A, E, and I and an O...

(help me out? Gotta fall over here, and brain's empty)

Posted July 30, 2008 1:00 AM by elise

(continuing)

my brainy friends were all agog!
And a U and even sometimes Y

So I linked my inks and tracked my backs
With an A, E, and I and an O
And loaded my site with the latest of hacks
And a U and even sometimes Y

(next!)

Posted July 30, 2008 1:16 AM by pericat

All jokes aside, I would quite like to see
A dictionary where the entries are
Laid out in sonnet form from A to Zee.
(Or 'Zed', of course, but then the rhyme would jar.)

Now I invite you, if you like, to guess:
Which entry is the first to which I'd go?
In fact, I'd find an entry under 'S'
That would perhaps begin a bit like so:

The sonnet is an old poetic form;
Its fourteen lines walk on iambic feet.
Though optional, pentameter's the norm.
(The iambs are essential: please don't cheat.)

And after that, to see a clever trick,
The sonnet that explains the limerick.

Posted July 30, 2008 1:33 AM by Paul A.

Arriving here from Limerick's distant shore
(Where lexicographers announce demand),
I find a gauntlet thrown by lyric hand
And undertake to lift it from the floor.

The limerick's terse: not six lines, neither four,
By anapest (perhaps one iamb) spanned.
One, two and five, constrained by rhyme's command,
Compel the --
            I can't do this anymore!

It's a feasible feat at first glance,
But I haven't got much of a chance.
Though I try not to cheat
And to follow the beat,
Still I've thirteen left feet in this dance.

Posted July 30, 2008 4:35 AM by Pam Greene (aka Snowy Owl)

You are Leet, Father William

“In my youth,” said the troll, “I took to the net,
to find out where someone was wrong.
And the consequent flamage made everyone sweat;
drove away those who didn't belong."

Posted July 30, 2008 5:25 AM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

Yet I fear very few would give the time,
To a lexicon constructed in the manner of the famous McGonnagall's scheme of rhyme,
Despite it's being in preparation for a considerable time.

Indeed, I'd rather spend my cash
And indeed give some deference
If there was a reference
in the style of Ogden Nash

Posted July 30, 2008 5:44 AM by Pete Darby

Poetry And You: Blunt Trochee Injury

Novices to writing poems
Choose the easy fallback option
Crafting verse octosyllabic
(Bang crash bang crash bang crash bang crash)
Rhymes superfluous (like talent)
On and on and never stopping
Like the mighty Gitchee Gummee
Like the shining Big Sea Water
(Now eutrophicated greenly
Due to excess nitrate runoff -
Gracias, Archer Daniels Midland!)

Posted July 30, 2008 6:45 AM by ajay

Alas! My tired brain cannot complete
a sonnet with its lines of walking feet
and so, although I long to join the game,
I gaze upon my offering with shame:

Sleepy baby, go to sleep.
Sleepy baby, soft and deep.
Sleepy baby, do not weep.
Sleepy baby, go to sleep.

Sleepy baby, go to bed.
Sleepy baby, rest your head.
Screaming baby, face all red...
sleepy baby, go to bed.

Unfortunate, my lines when put to song,
(although I feel I sang them all night long)
despite my charming tune and calming touch
the babe seems not to like them very much.

Posted July 30, 2008 7:00 AM by EClaire

I do not poet. But I verb in prose.

Posted July 30, 2008 9:26 AM by Johan Larson

Pete Darby at thirty-seven fears that very few would give the time,
To a lexicon constructed in the manner of the famous McGonnagall's scheme of rhyme,
Despite it's being in preparation for a considerable time.
But he fails to take into consideration the possibilities of expansion
Allowed for by that estimable Scottish poet’s execrable and most appalling scansion.

Posted July 30, 2008 10:00 AM by Tykewriter

Recycled from elsewhere in February, but so long as we're mixing constraints:

Lim'rick very brief;
Haiku lurks beneath.
"Bog,
Frog."
Basho begs relief.

Posted July 30, 2008 10:04 AM by Josh Millard

Abiwulf

Lo, praise of the prowess of poet-kings,
of the word-armed Dutch, in posts fast sped,
we have heard, and what honor the netlings won!

...

Famed was this Abiwulf: Far flew the boast of her,
one of the skalds, in the Scandian lands.
So becomes it a mod to meter well,
with her hosts' guests, by trochee and dactyl,
that to aid her, beset in other threads,
come warriors willing, should troll-war draw nigh,
lay-men loyal: by lauded words
shall a bard have honor in every land.

Posted July 30, 2008 10:47 AM by Malthus

Such talent, such fun -- this thread is great! Since I'm fighting the summer sinus headache today, I'll just offer an oldie I adapted for my cat when he weighed a few pounds less. My printout includes a sketch of a large black and white cat (paw over eyes, back feet up), with the last word in line two done in a suitably fuzzy font.

HORTON'S SONG

I weigh sixteen pounds -- ain't it enough?
Another day older and deeper in fluff.
Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go --
I owe my soul to my favorite bowl.

Posted July 30, 2008 11:39 AM by Faren Miller

At end of journey no place left to flee
but still we crave what lies beyond the reef
not knowing yet all of the modes of grief
each tacks their name upon the waiting tree.
You tell us simply wait and let time be,
leave urgency and haste to the old thief:
too soon we'll mourn each swiftly falling leaf,
and far too soon will curse the hateful sea.
Right now the sun fills the whole world with gold,
there seems no barrier to clearest truth
all of our senses proclaim highest noon;
no one will speak of days both dark and cold,
or tell us all the sournesses of ruth;
but now we want to hide in a cocoon.

Posted July 30, 2008 11:47 AM by Fragano Ledgister

A poetry thread's a delight
Witty verse bursting forth left and right
So I watch with a grin
Let the fireworks begin!
Making rhyme, making fun, Making Light

Posted July 30, 2008 12:08 PM by Rainflame

Sometimes long-lurking lurkers delurk/
Spurred by non-lurkers and boring work
Poetry threads are fun
Even for poem-foo = none
They might stay; usually: /relurk

Posted July 30, 2008 12:34 PM by Fishwood Loach

There has got to be a pun somewhere out there with non-lurker/on-looker but I tried to find it for an hour before I wrote the previous. :)

Posted July 30, 2008 12:41 PM by Fishwood Loach

PPaul A. @ 34:

The limerick's a jolly form of verse
Whose rhyming runs AA, BB, then A.
An ancient form -- Aquinas wrote the first --
It's now employed most usually at play.
Its meter: anapests (or amphibrachs),
The A's with three feet, and the B's with two.
(These groupings are the basic building blocks.
The rhythmic details can depend on you.)
And as for subject: Often it's obscene,
Involving fair Nantucket and her folk.
Still, many do prefer to keep it clean.
The only real requirement is a joke.

I see the forms of verse begin to mix --
So here! A sonnet on the limerick!

Posted July 30, 2008 12:41 PM by Caroline

Far-flung the fame of fleeting verse
Praised by poets, penurious of purse;
Clever writers, cudgeling for a curse
Found no family fortune in free verse
And wanting words of structure, write -- worse.

Posted July 30, 2008 12:45 PM by Tony Zbaraschuk

The Rattlin' Verse

Chorus:

I O the poet's verse, the verse down in the literary thread
I O the poet's verse, the verse down in the literary thread

Now in that verse there were quatrains, fine quatrains, literary quatrains. Fine quatrains, down in the verse, and the verse down in the thread-oh.

Cho.

Now in quatrains there are couplets, fine couplets, literary couplets. Fine couplets, in the quatrains, quatrains in the verse, and the verse down in the thread-oh.

Cho.

Now in couplets there are two lines, fine lines, literary lines. Fine lines, two per couplet, two per quatrain, quatrains in the verse, and the verse down in the thread-oh.

Cho.

Now in the lines are several feet, fine feet, literary feet. Fine feet in the line, lines in the couplet, two per quatrain, quatrains in the verse, and the verse down in the thread-oh.

Cho.

Now in the feet there are some words, fine words, literary words. Fine words in the foot, feet in the line, two lines per couplet, two per quatrain, quatrains in the verse, and the verse down in the thread-oh.

Cho.

Now at OEDLIF...
They define those words...
with fine verse
literary verse...

Verse in the words, words in the feet, feet in the line, lines in the couplet, two per quatrain, quatrains in the verse, and the verse down in the thread-oh.

Final Cho.

Posted July 30, 2008 1:34 PM by Jon Baker

In response to Fishwood Loach (but sorry, no pun)

The lurking onlooker delurks
Jumps in with his non-lurking works
An onlooker no longer
With confidence stronger
Wants non-lurking onlooker perks

Posted July 30, 2008 1:39 PM by Rainflame

Lurker lurks not for lack of confidence,
Lurker lurks for lack of sentiments
Antinspirational-
-Underemployment will
Stop any creativ– wait, there are perks?

Posted July 30, 2008 2:22 PM by Fishwood Loach

I read title as 'amphibians'.
Frogs, toads, and salamanders
Don't make good haiku.

(Yes, I know it has way too many syllables in the first line.)

Posted July 30, 2008 2:51 PM by Mary Aileen

I de-lurked to add to the fun, but was
Taken aback, seeing it'd already been done!
By someone quite articulate,
With rhyming immaculate....
Eala! Ic wille þin swetmetas bitan.*

*because when all else fails, Anglo-Saxon wins.

Posted July 30, 2008 2:57 PM by Avedaggio

Fixed version:

"Amphibians"

I read title wrong.
Frogs, toads, and salamanders
Don't make good haiku.

Posted July 30, 2008 3:07 PM by Mary Aileen

I can haz coffee
I can haz pomes

I only eat toffee
When I iz at homes

I can be silly
I can be deep

And both willy-nilly
when I am asleep

Posted July 30, 2008 3:19 PM by Terry Karney

Frogs, toads, salamanders
make fine haiku

I don't speak amphibian

Posted July 30, 2008 3:22 PM by Terry Karney

It's been months since my wit was last working
To participate here (it's been irking).
But a poetry thread's
Like a boot to the head
So for that, what the hell - I'm de-lurking.

Posted July 30, 2008 4:20 PM by Dan Layman-Kennedy

Looking back over this thread I see my last couple of poems were rather off-topic; here's a do-over.

Words crave meaning just as speakers crave the air.
Eloquence without it won't impress.
But finding meaning's hard, we oft despair.

When writing often I will sit and stare,
I want more meanings than my words possess.
Words crave meaning just as speakers crave the air.

I need some help so I'll not tear my hair;
some expert's words to take and then profess.
But finding meaning's hard, we oft despair.

There are net references I have found out there,
they help me find the words; alleviate distress.
Words crave meaning just as speakers crave the air.

Still, there's a better way, prose can't compare
to poesy wielded with finesse.
But finding meaning's hard, we oft despair.

Defining words with verse, you are aware,
makes meanings all the better to express.
Words crave meaning just as speakers crave the air.
But finding meaning's hard, we oft despair.

Posted July 30, 2008 4:59 PM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

There’s an online union called the Lurkers’ Guild
Or Bloggers’ Dandruff, Floating Forum Spam.
Their aim: to leave each comment box unfilled,
Their motto: everywhere I lurk, therefore I am.

Harmlessly haunting our stately blogs, mute
Other-dimensional beings in the virtual home.
(Whilst midnight surfing, ever had the acute
Feeling you’re being watched by lurkers as they roam?)

High they hover, seeking tit-bits
Cast off from the latest post.
Shame they don’t descend a bit, it’s
Rather rude to diss one’s host….

(From the above website, April 9 2008)

Posted July 30, 2008 5:07 PM by doggerelist

Delurking lurker having writ, relurks.

Posted July 30, 2008 5:31 PM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

Bruce, your #60 calls forth this, if our gentle hosts will permit me to repost something from a while back:

A poet with paper and pen is in business.
Don't let them know what you're doing.
Remember to keep your tools sharp.
Brush up on your covert ops skills.

Don't let them know what you're doing.
Poets know how to get past the borders.
Brush up on your covert ops skills --
It helps to look abstract, or pretty, or simple.

Poets know how to get past the borders;
A poem can be a way of smuggling truth.
It helps to look abstract, or pretty, or simple.
Some poems are strong enough to bear that.

A poem can be a way of smuggling truth.
Bones speak louder than official histories.
Some poems are strong enough to bear that.
A poet can owe a debt of story to a bone.

Bones speak louder than official histories.
Some things demand that we tell how they happened.
A poet can owe a debt of story to a bone
Or a stick, a charred stub, white stones, blood.

Some things demand that we tell how they happened.
A poet with paper and pen is in business,
Or a stick, a charred stub, white stones, blood.
Remember to keep your tools sharp.

Posted July 30, 2008 5:53 PM by elise

elise:

Ninja poets write
stories of bone, of deep time.
Truth demands voice.

Posted July 30, 2008 6:32 PM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

We lurkers don't get no respect
But really, what can we expect?
We're reclusive it's true
And we're spying on you
While we keep ourselves hard to detect

Posted July 30, 2008 7:18 PM by Rainflame

So simple these words,
so clear the modes of light;
I wait for silence.

Posted July 30, 2008 8:06 PM by Fragano Ledgister

The delurking lurker having writ,
Left boring job one for number two;
Interesting, but less money in it

Posted July 30, 2008 8:37 PM by Fishwood Loach

My poetry is nothing like the sun
You regulars read more than I have read
If abi's be ten, why then my verse is one
If words be fires, cool flames go from my head.
I have seen genius, in rhyme and reason right;
No such genius sees (s)he who here seeks.
And in this thread so far is more delight
Than in the awkward lines this "poet" speaks.
I love to try to filk, yet well I know
The source hath yet a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I must at least be quite a show,
My poems, when I share, aren't passed around.

And yet, for shame, I find I cannot care
I do not write for praise or false compare.

Posted July 30, 2008 9:56 PM by Gwen

Urk. "Truth demands a voice." I swear I saw that 'a' there when I previewed the comment. Well, time to increase the meds, and ask the voices pretty please to help me preview my comments.

Posted July 31, 2008 1:18 AM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

Some say the limerick's always rude;
Some say it's trite.
Defending verses that I've viewed
I'd ask the critics to get screwed.
We've wit and whimsy, bounce and bite.
Though rarely rated as divine
I'd say these rhythmic riffs we write
Are always fine
For Making Light.

Posted July 31, 2008 11:52 AM by Virge

There is no shame in raising a sweet word.
Rhyme holds reason up to see the sun.
Comparisons are odious when verse is done.
I do not ask my sonnets be preferred.
Instead I want all speakers voicing rhyme,
and writing so their lines will often scan.
The joy verse brings to others is my plan,
and song that's raised to fill our space and time.
Spirit's not a thing of gods and ghosts,
it's how our minds relate to all around.
Verse fills up that spirit, makes it abound
with all the feelings that we value most.
It's no surprise than that I do not care
whose verse is better, as long as verse we share.

Posted July 31, 2008 6:09 PM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

Gwen @ #68:

You love to try to filk? Ah! So do I!
When one is of that ilk, one can't deny
The lure of a container, ready-made.
I won't be a complainer; why not trade
A box of common song for something new?
To filk stuff is not wrong; it's what we do.

Posted July 31, 2008 7:46 PM by elise

Tania, consider the terzanelle*,
Which at first glance might look hard to tell
from villanelle's strictures,
but don't trust those pictures,
you get many more rhymes that might jell.

------------
* which, considering yesterday's news and the events of right now, makes me want to repost mine**.

**
For My Niece

Fire, song, food, gifts: we celebrate your years
Now you are four, by an ancient measure
You whisper wishes: the candle's smoke clears.

We are our years, and held by this tether
One more gear of the antikythera
Now you are four, by an ancient measure.

Our measures tie to Gaia and Terra
I shall measure my life in eclipses
One more gear of the antikythera.

I too am four, in octaeteridis
Not yet one Halley, but two in Saros,
I shall measure my life in eclipses

More than one light comes from nature's pharos
Giving us a billionth anno mundi
Not yet one Halley, but two in Saros.

You dance, the center of our orrery
Fire, song, food, gifts: we celebrate your years
Giving us a billionth anno mundi
You whisper wishes: the candle's smoke clears.

Posted August 1, 2008 5:35 AM by Kathryn from Sunnyvale

62: Delurking lurker having writ, relurks.

Delurking Lurker writes, and having writ,
Relurks, but all that Jollity and Wit
May hale him back to Write another Line
And - who knows? - Hang Around and Chat a Bit.

Posted August 1, 2008 7:10 AM by ajay

The outlook wasn't brilliant for the Fluorosphere that night.
The trolls had formed a phalanx, wearing robes of white.
Jim was driving ambulance, and Patrick at a con;
Ev'ry patron asked the question, "Where has Teresa gone?"

But abi brought the munchies, and jugs of lemonade,
And a tigress with a Vickers was set up in enfilade.
Star Fleet was armed and ready, fire button under thumb.
The Fluorosphere was waiting, all the phasers set to "Pun!"

Then a cat ran out and savaged the left foot of a troll,
And two kittens did the string-thing with a rather woolly roll.
White-robed like a Klansman, the troll that ajay mocks,
Is no more than a puppet, stuffed with mis-matched socks.

Posted August 1, 2008 8:04 AM by Dave Bell

De lurking?
The poesy thread is working.
Here some who just read most times
rhyme.

While threading
the prose Fluorosphere's headings
Oft what I'd say in a thread's
said

By senders
with eloquence which renders
what I'd like to contribute
moot.

A poem
Is less prone to this problem.
Moot points bought new life by warm
forms.

Posted August 1, 2008 8:25 AM by Niall McAuley

Today is 1 August, Emancipation Day in the former British Empire.

This is the moment when all things begin,
until this hour we were just made for gain;
the world becomes ours now to lose or win.

We do not care if millwheels cease to spin,
all sugar's sweetness came from human pain;
this is the moment when all things begin.

Now we may have our say without chagrin
the master's silence making matters plain:
the world becomes ours now to lose or win.

No sign of sorrow shows now on the skin,
no hint of any horror or harsh bane;
this is the moment when all things begin.

A sunrise such as this has never been
greeted by such a single joyous strain,
the world becomes ours now to lose or win;

and now we cast our anger in the bin
and wipe out all the years of horrid stain;
this is the moment when all things begin,
the world becomes ours now to lose or win.

Posted August 1, 2008 10:20 AM by Fragano Ledgister

A thousand stories wait still to be told,
we pack our visions up and wrap them tight;
this is the season when we pan for gold.

Your task to herd the lost sheep into fold
and do so swiftly for too soon comes night,
a thousand stories wait still to be told.

At height of summer not a one fears cold
but you alone are left to warn of blight,
this is the season when we pan for gold.

Give us the measure and we shall take hold
of all the matters set within our sight,
a thousand stories wait still to be told.

You seek to have all good things tightly rolled
into the pattern while they are still bright,
this is the season when we pan for gold.

Not one thing happens that is not controlled
or so we hope as long as we have light;
a thousand stories wait still to be told,
this is the season when we pan for gold.

Posted August 1, 2008 12:46 PM by Fragano Ledgister

My limericks are little but facile
Creating them is dreadful hassle
Their one saving grace
Keeps a smile on my face
As I hear them all in the voice of Carl Kassel

Posted August 1, 2008 9:02 PM by Krinn DNZ

On not having a gift for rhyme

If words were numbers, mine would all be primes.
My brain won't sort its topics out by sound --
The filing system's more like a thesaurus.

I swear, I must have tried a zillion times
To graft rhymes onto meanings, but still found
Them distant from me as Ulan Bator is.

Posted August 2, 2008 6:48 PM by Teresa Nielsen Hayden

I don't think I've ever seen 'thesaurus' and 'Ulan Bator' in the same poem before. I think my mind is boggling.

Posted August 2, 2008 8:21 PM by P J Evans

Kathryn @ #73 and Teresa @ #80 have both won my entire heart, plus all the internets in my pocketses.

Posted August 2, 2008 9:12 PM by elise

TNH #80: That's not having a gift?

Posted August 2, 2008 9:27 PM by Fragano Ledgister

As a baseball fan, I'm quite enamored of Dave Bell's work @ #75.

Posted August 2, 2008 9:36 PM by Linkmeister

My words are irreducible,
but rhyming's not dividing.
The words that rhyme just form for me
an equivalence class.

So stanzas are producible
empirically deciding
if we want rhymes we hear or see
and which rhythm will pass.

[*] You have to pronounce it E-quiv-A-lance.

Posted August 3, 2008 1:42 AM by albatross

Himmery-shimmery
forgotten memory
holidays celebrate
all the wrong things

freeing the slaves should be
our greatest memory
followed by orbits, great
moonshots and wings

Posted August 3, 2008 1:47 AM by albatross

challenge rings
-are you reading?
'crost the net
-what we're needing
a wonderful night
filled with making light
writing in an open poem thread

kept at bay
-are the botnets
for today
-we've got sonnets[1]
we'll break into song
all the thread long
writing in an open poem thread

In the ether we've got open mike night
bring your limmericks, sonnets, villanelles
Noobs with knocking knees can brave the stage fright
and we'll draw deeper from our rhyming wells

In a week
-we'll remember
as we flame
-'til November
the politics vile
of some guy who made us smile
writing in an open poem thread.

[1] What? They almost rhyme.

Posted August 3, 2008 2:17 AM by albatross

With vocabulary and wit at hand
I can rhyme for you on demand
But I still utter curses
over my trite verses
Insignificant, predictable, bland*

*but I'm working on it! Practice, practice, practice

Posted August 3, 2008 2:46 AM by Tania

And then there's alliterative poetry (an aid to memory, according to this). Without trying to match the original meters, I rattled off a bit of it:

From frosty fjord to saltiest sea,
Bards blew men's minds --
Ah, alliteration!

Alas, an art
We seldom see today.
That lack leaves me

Mirthless. Wearily waiting
For those close consonants,
I've got the Beowulf blues.

Posted August 3, 2008 12:57 PM by Faren Miller

Verses about "Dinosaurs and Sodomy" should be written in double-'dactyls.

Posted August 7, 2008 3:32 PM by Erik Nelson

Erik @90:

The phrase "dinosaur sodomy" is a double dactyl, as I found to my vexation when I was trying to write a sonnet on the subject. (Though my metrical troubles were productive of genuis by Dan Layman-Kennedy.)

I did succeeded in the end with the sonnet.

Posted August 7, 2008 3:49 PM by abi

Damn it all, abi, I work for a Vry Srs Company now. I can't be seen all giggling and blushing at my desk.

(Nonetheless: tee hee! And Thanks.)

Posted August 7, 2008 4:09 PM by Dan Layman-Kennedy

I meant double-dactyls as in a pair o' ptero's.

Posted August 8, 2008 2:19 PM by Erik Nelson