Thread: 8D - VerseWorks - Renga: Collaborative Poem - or, If You Like Haiku, You'll Love.... Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.
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Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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The description of a Renga. Alternating stanzas of 3 lines/17 syllables with 2 lines, each of 7 syllables. But being Japanese, there's a little bit more to it than that. Let's give it a whirl.
Theme: Summer
Trees stand still
As the courtiers
Of an implacable emperor.
[ 31. August 2014, 23:19: Message edited by: RuthW ]
Posted by StevHep (# 17198) on
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Tired courtesans the drooping
Flower beds thirsty for light
Posted by Welease Woderwick (# 10424) on
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The soft and gentle
rain falls with mild sussuration
upon leaf mold
Posted by StevHep (# 17198) on
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Warm summer rains refresh tired
Earth, life renewed from above
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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In the dusk of its single day
The crane fly dances
Against the glass.
Posted by Chesterbelloc (# 3128) on
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Slowly, in a flesh-warm sigh,
The stone breathes back the sun's loan.
Posted by StevHep (# 17198) on
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Night sounds, night stillness.
Darkness and mild summer warmth
A fragrant garden
Posted by Welease Woderwick (# 10424) on
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honeysuckle scent lingers
and the sweet night-scented stock
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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On the low bending branch
Those are red berries
That once were white flowers.
Posted by StevHep (# 17198) on
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Hungry crows snatch at berries,
Black clad raucous destruction.
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
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Nesting jackdaws chirp,
Chink and chirr metallic'ly,
Gossip to their mates.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
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Around bright orange bonfires
Neighbours gather to watch sparks fall.
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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We're getting some good stuff here. Let's step it up ever so slightly. One of the features of renga is the subtleties of connection between the verses, which may be by association or contrast, but which always provide a new thought or perception. We have a good example in the berries - crows - jackdaws - sequence above.
I suggest we formalise this by using either the same word from the preceding verse* or something which is the same class of object (bird, flower, time of day etc).
*only the immediately preceding one. Every Renga verse is part of two poems: one formed by pairing it with the verse before, one with the verse after.
Posted by Gwai (# 11076) on
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Wood crackles, Marshmallows
Roast below fall leaves,
And laughter in twilight.
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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A summer's day ends replete
As silence after laughter.
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
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Snorting and gurgling
in joyous abandonment
souls rejuvenate
Posted by StevHep (# 17198) on
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Joy too comes with the dawn.
Eyes shine with reflected light.
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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A reminder to count those syllables. The fact that you think of a neat phrase and it turns out to be just too long or too short, and you have to rethink and, as Beckett says, Fail better - is precisely the point of the exercise.
The memory of summer
Is quiet as the light
Of sunless days.
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
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Harvesting machinery
Drowns crickets' chirp and bees' buzz.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
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Days of summer passed
Away on the stream of time.
All comes to harvest.
[ 30. July 2014, 18:38: Message edited by: Dafyd ]
Posted by QLib (# 43) on
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The scythe that sliced the corn stalks
Now rests by the graveyard wall.
Posted by StevHep (# 17198) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
A reminder to count those syllables. The fact that you think of a neat phrase and it turns out to be just too long or too short, and you have to rethink and, as Beckett says, Fail better - is precisely the point of the exercise.
The memory of summer
Is quiet as the light
Of sunless days.
* Tangent alert
According to the Haiku Syllable Counter the lines
Joy too comes with the dawn.
Eyes shine with reflected light.
Have 7 syllables each
* End of tangent
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
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Gap-toothed drunken lines
Ivy-covered, grass buried
Inscriptions age blurred
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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quote:
Originally posted by StevHep:
* Tangent alert
According to the Haiku Syllable Counter the lines
Joy too comes with the dawn.
Eyes shine with reflected light.
Have 7 syllables each
* End of tangent
Good grief, what will they think of next? Anyway, based purely on muttering and counting fingers....
Briefly bright new ivy leaves
Flash like fish in a green stream.
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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Thirty six verses make up a renga. So if we can clock another 13, we can award ourselves the Japanese equivalent of knocking off and going to the pub.
Rain-bent montbretia laps
Over the path in a green wave
Edged with flame.
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
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Flame-edged clouds herald sunset,
Heaven's pyrotechnic show.
(I was trying not to steal all the Haikus)
Posted by QLib (# 43) on
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The sun sinks slowly.
Behind the hills, liquid light drains
From the denim sky.
Posted by Doublethink (# 1984) on
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The dusk cloaked downs breathe out
Shedding the burdens of time
[ 03. August 2014, 21:40: Message edited by: Doublethink ]
Posted by QLib (# 43) on
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Long-eared bats chase
fluttering moths over the still
so silent barrows.
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
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Ears twitch, listening intently,
Ladybird creeps up stem: pounce.
(Long-eared bats fascinate me, they can hear insects walking on leaves.)
Posted by jacobsen (# 14998) on
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Watch my cats as they too
Crouch, patiently awaiting
A wind-blown leaf.
Posted by QLib (# 43) on
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Petals flutter down. A mouse
Scutters through. A cat pounces.
Posted by jacobsen (# 14998) on
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Night's denizens - owls,cats,bats-
Are on the hunt:
Small furry ones, beware.
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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Something hunted in our dreams
But slipped the snare of waking.
Posted by QLib (# 43) on
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Returns, magnified
As, in a darker dreamland,
We become its prey.
(I make that two more to go – and, when we get there, mine's a pint of Guinness and cider.)
Posted by jacobsen (# 14998) on
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Waking is such sweet relief
From dreamland's haunting visions.
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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The warm summer night sleeps
To wake on a cool morning
Edged with autumn.
Qlib, it'll be a small sake and a gawp at a chrysanthemum.
Posted by jacobsen (# 14998) on
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OK we might as well continue with Autumn
Inevitable as the days
Which are drawing in,
The nights draw out.
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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Nooooo! We didn't finish with the two lines! Obscure Japanese phantoms will now rise from wells and pursue us!
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
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Swallows twitter, group in lines
Migrate at unseen signal
(Would that do as the final bit of the Renga?)
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on
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That'll do.
We can either attempt another 36 stanzas, or start another syllabic verse thread - haiku, say, or tanka.
Posted by Doublethink (# 1984) on
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It might be worth trying something like this, so a thread where someone specifies a form, then communally we try to create one following the rule. Once complete someone else specifies the form, and the process repeats.
Posted by jacobsen (# 14998) on
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The Alouette(French for Skylark) is a stanzaic invented form with an unusual meter. The form is syllabic with a recommended prominent stress in the 3rd syllable of each line. It was created by Jan Turner. The Alouette is:
stanzaic, any number of sixains.
syllabic , 5-5-7-5-5-7 syllables per line with the prominent stress in the 3rd syllable of each line.
rhymed, rhyme scheme aabccb ddeffe gghiih etc.
Month of August by Judi Van Gorder
Begun as month six,
eighth after the fix,
named for Emperor of Rome.
Just thirty-one days, in hot summer haze,
Augustus ascended his throne.
OK? Here's my attempt:
Oh, let not my cat
Sitting on the mat
Scratch my new expensive chair.
If she does, then she
Will no longer be;
Which will leave me half a pair*.
On the other hand
Playing in the sand
She's delightful and so sweet.
I love to stroke her
Soft touchable fur
From head to her furry feet.
*I have two cats
Posted by QLib (# 43) on
:
In the soulless dark
You can't hear the lark
That flies, singing loud, on high
For your hate and spite
Both put out the light
And shut you off from the sky.
As to why you so
Chose to sail solo
On that lonely stream of bile,
I can only guess
But nevertheless
Must bemoan a jail so vile.
It's still no too late
Abandon your hate.
You can surely light a spark
One kind word or deed
Is all that you need
To sit no more in the dark.
[I'm not sure about this third syllable business, jacobsen – van Gorder certainly fails to convince in that respect: 'as', '-ter', 'for' ? You do a better job, but I don't think it's a form desigend for English]
Posted by Doublethink (# 1984) on
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We appear to have de-Rengad, so I have started a new thread - to try out experimental forms.
Doublethink
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