hyde park poetry week 123,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

poetry picnic week 83, midterm exam could be tricky

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

montana western university

 

 

university of washington at seattle, washington,

 

 

poetry form week 87, villanelle

 Length: 19 lines
Stanzas: 5 tercets and a quatrain
Metrical requirements: none
Rhyme scheme: Too complicated to summarize

 

 

These components are arranged into the following:

A1BA2 / ABA1 / ABA2 / ABA1 / ABA2 / ABA1A2

 

 

One Art

 

Elizabeth Bishop - 1911-1979

 

 

The art of  winning is easy to predict:

so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is considered a gain next time

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.

to prevent missing a key, you carry a handbag

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. a change of mind will matter when you're reborn

I lost my mother’s watch. And look at my last, or
next-to-last, of  three resident locations.
The art of losing can make you stay awake.

I lostfour cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, three rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but I land on mars in my dreams.

 

—Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident
the art of losing’s not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like a cheerful tear