Seguidilla


The Seguidilla began as a popular dance song of Spain. The verse form was established and branched into variations by the 17th century. It has an alternating long short rhythm.

The Seguidilla is:
• stanzaic, written in any number of 2 part septets. (7 lines)
• syllabic, 7-5-7-5 : 5-7-5 per line. There is a slight pause between L4 and L5 suggesting L4 should be end-stopped.
• rhymed by assonance xaxabxb or xaxabab. x being unrhymed. True rhyme is generally not used.
• composed with a volta or change in thought between L4 and L5.
• sometimes serves as a conclusion for another verse.

Pase Doble by Judi Van Gorder

The rapid click of slick heels
pounding on the boards,
play a staccato death knell 
for life never mourned.
The red of his cape,
a splash of blood on the floor,
the matador’s fate. .

Pasted from http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?showtopic=1014
My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.

My Example
(Form: Seguidilla)

Cueca Chilena Dance

Cueca Chilena Dance

He with boots and spurs and cape,
She in flowing dress,
(Cumbia, perhaps), and heels.
Hat upon his head.
Both will kick and stamp
their feet and twirl kerchiefs while
caught up in the dance.

© Lawrencealot – January 21, 2015

Photo Credit https://latindancehistory.wordpress.com/2010/11/30/la-cueca/

Visual Template
Seguidilla

Septet II

Septet II
Type:  Structure, Metrical Requirement
Description:  An English syllabic form with line syllable counts of: 3, 5, 7, 9, 7, 5, 3
Origin:  England
Schematic:
xxx
xxxxx
xxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxx
xxxxx
xxx
Rhythm/Stanza Length:  7
Line/Poem Length:          7

Pasted from http://www.poetrybase.info/forms/005/570.shtml
My thanks to Charles L. Weatherford for his years of work on the wonderful Poetrybase resource.
_________

• Septet II is an invented form using the 7 lines of the septet and adding a syllable count to the lines. Its origin is England according to Poetry Base.

The Septet II is:
○ stanzaic, written in any number of septets, (7 line stanzas).
○ syllabic, 3-5-7-9-7-5-3 lines.
○ unrhymed or rhyme at the discretion of the poet.

Blackberry Patch by Judi Van Gorder

Summertime
along the roadway
cardboard paths wind through brambles
where locals freely come to pick sweet
berries from the prickly vines.
Purple juices stain
my fingers.

Pasted from http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?/topic/1197-forms-found-at-poetry-basepoetry-gnosis/

My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.

My example poem

It Must Have Been Something I Ate (Septet II)

Cogitate
let thoughts incubate,
deliberate at some length
contemplate if thinking is your strength,
then speculate and
ruminate.

© Lawrencealot – August 19, 2014

Visual Template
Septet II

Brain Strain Refrain

During my first two years on Allpoetry it became obvious that one of, if not the most utilized new form was Jan Turner’s Trijan Refrain. To honor it, and simultaneously give a poet a vehicle for a weightier topic, with more flexibility I created, what I now consider an ill-advised form which in a contest was given the name San Gabriel Refrain. I consider it ill-advised because it has too much flexibility and therefore is fine as a writing exercise, but loses it’s identity as a recognizable form. It has one more line than the venerable TR, the first line need not be repeated in each stanza, and the refrain may be taken from one line and repeated, be multiple refrains taken from any of the longer lines. Later, I amended the specs to allow iambic pentameter, further diluting the form identity.
I am now of the opinion that a new form should be identifiable, and that all deviations from the specific requirements be simply up to the poet’s discretion.
There comes now a newer form created by Allan Emery, aka Joe King on Allpoetry which has a unique identity, with one fewer lines than the TR, but with no stanza limit, or line one repetition requirement.
I have interpreted the specifications as:
It is stanzaic, consisting of any number of septets
It is syllabic: 8/8/8/8/4/4/8
It is rhymed: aabbccb
It requires the first half of L3 to be a repeated refrain as lines 5 and 6
It is metric, writing in iambic tetrameter/dimeter.
I proposed the name of this form to be the Bastard Refrain and ran an Allpoetry contest.  The participation was slight, and some thought it was because the name put off some, so it has been re-christened the Brain Strain Refrain.
My example poem:
Lifted (Brain Strain Refrain)
Her wings are hidden but they’re there
beneath her golden locks of hair
unseen by men who walk this earth,
who note her happiness and mirth.
Unseen by men –
unseen by men
though all of them can see her worth.
Those wings extend to touch my mind
and when our thoughts are so combined
We fly to heights reserved for few.
I’m blessed by being loved by you.
We fly to heights;
We fly to heights
while other people have no clue.
© Lawrencealot – June 3, 2014
Visual Template
Bastard Refrain

California Rhyme Stanza

Invented by Barbara Dilworth and introduced at VoleCentral

The California Rhymed Stanza is:
isosyllabic (same number of syllables each line)
stanzaic, any number of septets (seven-line stanza)
rhymed pattern: ababcbc
meter optional

My thanks to Ron Newman at Volecentral for this information, his site is a wonderful resource.
 
Example Poem

Surrogate    (California Rhyme Stanza)
I am a cheater I’ll admit
I rarely delve into my mind
and find new notions to submit.
left to myself I’d be behind
the eight-ball waiting for my muse,
but seeing other’s work, I find,
will often give me writing clues.
The art may come from any field,
from folks way more profound than I.
With cutting tools that artists wield
they show what’s hidden to the eye.
Then sometimes, somehow, I’m allowed
to tell how their work makes me high,
to share their visions makes me proud.
© Lawrencealot – November 9, 2013
 
 
Visual Template
Here I created a pentameter template then chose to write 
iambic tetrameter.




Rhyme Royal

The rhyme royal stanza consists of seven lines, usually in iambic pentameter. 
The rhyme scheme is ababbcc. In practice, the stanza can be constructed 
either as a tercet and two couplets (a-b-a, b-b, c-c) or 
a quatrain and a tercet (a-b-a-b, b-c-c). 
This allows for a good deal of variety, especially when the form is used for 
longer narrative poems and along with the couplet, 
it was the standard narrative metre in the late Middle Ages.
Example Poem
Tenpus Ambigua        (Rhyme Royal)
The concept time is quite beyond my ken.
String theory baffles brilliant folks and me.
I’ll not wax philosophical again.
Perhaps I did already, shame on me.
We’d be confused in synchronicity.
For flies who live for but a single day,
young boys and men would seem two breeds at play.
¨*•.¸¸¸¸.•*¨*•? .?.•*»? ??•*¨*•.¸¸¨*•.¸¸¸¸.•*¨*•
We can tell larva and the grown-up fly
are one, we see them grow. They must mistake
we humans as a species that won’t die.
Our sense of time is different awake
or when asleep, and tasks a diff’rence makes.
Don’t tell a guy that seconds are the same
while shov’ling shit or kissing up a dame.
© Lawrencealot – July 12, 2013
 
Visual Template
 
 

Triquain

Triquain…created by Shelley Cephas,
A Triquain is a seven line poem with syllables in multiples of 3 as follows:
3, 6, 9, 12, 9, 6, 3 This form is always centered.
syllabic,3/6/9/12/9/6/3,unrhymed,7 lines
ALWAYS Centered
 
 
Example Poem:
 

Interim Heaven  (Triquain chain – Cephas) 

 
The puppy
brought to the hospital
where the boy was dying adopted
him on first sight.  The lad’s pain was subdued by drugs.
Nothing could subdue the instant joy
filling him as he hugged
The puppy.
 
The cancer
would not relent, and yet
the boy’s eyes were brighter than before
and he never cried another day.  The puppy
snuggled when he slept and licked his face;
played gently other times
with the boy.
 
When the boy
passed on while he slept, the
puppy knew and whined, parents wept.  In
tears a younger brother took the pup, who shut up
and licked away that boy’s tears.  Wiping
grief away, replacing
it with love.
 
(c) Lawrencealot – May 7,2012
 
 
Visual Template:

As it happened, the Triquain above was the first one that I encountered.
It was not however, the first form given the name.

• The Triquain, found in Berg’s Pathways for the Poet 1977 appears to be an attempt at combining the haiku and Crapsey cinquain. It was created by L. Stanley Cheney and referred to in both the Caulkins’ Handbook and Pathways. This form comes a little closer to the purpose of haiku than some other haiku wannabees. There is another invented form also called a Triquain that appeared on the internet about 25 years later written in a syllabic heptastich.

The Triquain is:
○ a tristich, a poem in 3 lines. It is composed in 3 units, L1 introduces the subject, L2 expands and leads into action, L3 is the enlightenment or question.
○ syllabic, with 2-7-7 syllable count per line.
○ Titled, unlike the haiku.

stud by Judi Van Gorder

newborn
leggy colt struggles to stand
first of many challenges

Pasted from http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?showtopic=1188#triquain
My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.

My example

Inquiry (Triquan-Cheney)

questions
preceding words, as babble
most unanswered before death

(c) Lawrencealot – October 29, 2014