Today, I’d like to challenge you to write a poem using Skeltonic verse.
Don’t worry, there are no skeletons involved. Rather, Skeltonic verse
gets its name from
John Skelton,
a fifteenth-century English poet who pioneered the use of short stanzas
with irregular meter, but two strong stresses per line (otherwise know
as “dipodic” or “two-footed” verse). The lines rhyme, but there’s not a
rhyme scheme
per se. The poet simply rhymes against one word until he or she gets bored and moves on to another. Here is a good
explainer of the form, from which I have borrowed this excellent example:
Existential Guinea-pig
Existential Guinea-pig
in a cage, not too big
waiting for a music gig
that never comes. Fig.
Not that he can play a
note
but what he wrote
would float your boat
arranged for quote
string and voice
unquote
contents devote,
beloved sounds
in squeaks and bounds.
Beloved clowns
in rainbow gowns
surround the towns
and charge a measly
forty pounds
to watch them jig
to Existential Guinea
Pig.
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