Hi all
I had a supervision meeting today, and to cut a long story short I came
away having agreed to write an Elizabethan sonnet in 25 minutes.

I chose a subject I had thought a lot about, and came up with the
following, which I want to email asap. It was great fun, I recommend
it, but I had some trouble keeping track of the metre, being a sort of
4:4 person. So I wonder if some poetrat might check it?


Spoiler space (snipped, Ed.) for Buffyrats - contact me or Neil to find out whether you
are a Buffyrat to whom this applies

Spike

What freedom when you have already died
To walk the night and sleep the day away
To keep your youth and strength and looks and pride.
Your goal is still the same: just one good day.

Immortal though with no immortal soul
The well-aimed stake the only thing to fear
No conscience modifies your self control
No reason not to lie or be sincere.

You are forever thirty and you keep
The knowledge of a hundred years undead.
Although you do not breathe, you bleed and weep
And all for words both said and words unsaid.

What demon bargain have you made with pain
To take possession of your soul again?

-- 
Jill Treasure

A quick review suggests that it's OK;
The rhyming scheme and metre both work fine.
It surely must have taken you all day
It takes me half an hour to write one line.

The 8-6 split is there as it should be,
The final couplet's great - it really is.
I reckon that its real poetry,
of real class - no feeble doggerel this.

I'm not surprised you chose to write on Spike
Unlike the Scooby Gang he has a charm
That makes him hard to actively dislike
Despite his plots to do poor Buffy harm.

I hope these comments put your mind at rest -
If not, well then, at least I tried my best.

-- 
Stephen

I've never tried to write a villanelle
The rhyming scheme looks tricky to maintain
Oh well, here goes, Umrats please wish me well.

It's nineteen lines as far as I can tell
With just two rhymes used time and time again
(I've never tried to write a villanelle).

The tricky bit's the way you have to gel
The first and third lines into a refrain.
Oh well, here goes, Umrats please wish me well.

I think this repetition helps propel
The poem (and let me once again explain
I've never tried to write a villanelle.)

Twelve lines done - my mind starts to rebel
Seven left - I start to feel the strain
Oh well, here goes, Umrats please wish me well.

But now the end's in sight; I hear the bell
The final lap (well, stanza or quatrain).
I've never tried to write a villanelle,
Oh well, here goes, Umrats please wish me well.

Not quite up to Wendy Cope's standards I fear. She also does Double
Dactyls, which are possibly even more rule-bound than Villanelles if
you do them strictly by the book.

-- 
Stephen