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  • Random Quote

    “The essence of dramatic tragedy is not unhappiness. It resides in the solemnity of the remorseless working of things.... [But] this inevitableness of destiny can only be illustrated in terms of human life by incidents which in fact involve unhappiness. For it is only by them that the futility of escape can be made evident in the drama.”

    —William Forster Lloyd
  • Sample Poems

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    Next Up: Soji

    Tuesday, June 30th, 2009

    While Twitter is often lampooned as empty chatter, I’m finding it an increasingly rich source of news and information. (Just look at what it has done in terms of revealing the aftermath of Iran’s election.)

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    What Could Be Verse?

    Monday, June 15th, 2009

    The first time that I ever wrote a sonnet,
    ’Twas filled with grand Romantic affectation,
    As tho’ perhaps Shelley or Keats had done it
    And I had merely taken poor dictation.
    And so I tried to write free verse instead,
    Which left me feeling somewhat loose and sore
    As if, instead of a four-poster [...]

    Elsewhere

    Wednesday, June 3rd, 2009

    There was an age in which this brown field,
    the brown, veiny trees beyond,
    the wind above like unbreaking surf,
    could lure my feet
    across the spongy soil
    its brittle, weedy carpet,
    into the stippled shadows
    where the fellowship of empty branches
    could brim me over
    with shimmering melancholy.
    However,
    I am expected elsewhere,

    and so a paler shade of feeling
    must sustain.
     
     
    —Lester Smith
     
     
    (Originally appeared in Woud [...]

    Poetic Forms: Haiku, Senryu, Tanka, and Lunes

    Friday, May 29th, 2009

    counting sylllables
    mentioning cherry blossoms
    this is not haiku
    (from Zen Rampage, back cover)
    Haiku
    Everyone knows what a haiku is, right? A poem in three lines, with seventeen syllables divided five/seven/five.

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