Patricia M Osborne

Here’s our latest addition to the Penta Decima from Maxine Rose Munro. Thank you, Maxine, for sharing, For a Given Value with us.

If anyone else would like to attempt a Penta Decima and share it, please feel free to add in comments or email me on patricia.m.osbornewriter@gmail.com and I’ll add it to the blog.

Maxine’s Poem. 

Hey, Patricia! Below is my effort. Some flaws, including a slant rhyme (though in my defence there is a full rhyme in the same line, more if you count my slight overuse of the word “can”!). Bit of a word play one, but was a highly enjoyable exercise. Thanks for encouraging everyone to give it a go.

For a Given Value

For a given value of ok, I am.
If we ignore insults and injuries
to my person, I’m just fine.

Fine to get a move on and
kickstart the day, fine to face
that music and dance.

Despite it all, I think still I can
paint a smile on, I have kept
necessary supplies always

close at hand, I can pretend
it’s real as real can be. Honest
to god, I promise.

But it’s a lie. (to tell the truth)
So, now, I wonder – how the hell
are you? (for a given value?)

 

 

Hi everyone

Well I am still working on my draft, Monochrome, in my new invented form the Penta Decima. How are you getting on with it?

Daniel Crowley has taken to this form very well. Here’s his early draft.

SHE HAS RISEN

She’s like a dolphin coursing through the sea-
though the waves are rough she stays on course,
her heart is set upon her highest goal.

And all that matters in this to me,
is that she finds her way despite the wrecks
which litter life at every point.

She made her choice to live completely free
of ties which might hold her down,
so every time she’s trapped she races

to the highest points by which she
navigates, to find the way ahead-
her family of dolphins follow close by.

I hope she never looks back too far,
her path is now one of forward drive
which might fail to be her guiding star.

Daniel Crowley (2017)

 

Colin Ward author of his debut novel To Die For

has also had an attempt  using the rules, and then experimented within them. And what a great attempt it is, wouldn’t you agree?

The Final Fight

Darkness: do not betray me now
Sink me amidst your velvet swirls
And mask me in mystery

Shadows: hold back your furrowed brow
Embrace me in your bordered reach
Don’t hide your sworn sympathy

Night time: be light in fear somehow
Spare me the peace of silent bliss
So truth might lose sincerity

Blindness: never forget your vow
Open my ears to freedom sounds
And guide me to new clarity

So that my soul might season a new sight
As each obstacle crosses a cruel fate
And no single battle may weaken my final fight.

CW
09/2017
(Draft 1)

 

I’d love to hear what you think of Colin’s and Daniel’s poems.

Here’s a reminder of the rules if you’d like to give one a go yourself too.

 

Rules of the Penta Decima

A Penta Decima consists of:

15 lines.

5 stanzas written in tercets.

The first line of the first four stanzas rhyme with each other.

First and third line rhyme in the final stanza.

The lines are not syllable controlled so offer freedom.