Poetry Revised: What's the Crime In Rhyme?

Patricia is a former English teacher who hoped to pass her love of writing, literature, poetry,and (gasp!) kind behavior on to her students.

Preface:

Some people absolutely

Insist

That life is a

Free verse piece...

They sneer at the mere suggestion

That rhyme and meter

Play any kind of role

in the genre.

It flows, they say,

Not from point a to point b,

but rather meanders,

As a stream unchecked,

Propelled by nothing

Save motion,

To a point short of

Immortality

and a purpose deemed

Whatever.

Proposition:

Not I.

Despite dersion

And sneers

At the discipline

Of the device,

I prefer to believe-

I desperately cling to the hope that

Life is a series of stanzas,

A work in which I count the measured feet

And move in tandem with the proscribed beat

So ultimately patterns will- voila- appear

To dissipate the jagged lines of fear

And give direction to what seems to be

The paradox I've come to know as me.

Poetic Exhibit #1: Rhyme...Time

Wonder

Where the time

Went?

Spent

The decades in

Repose?

Suppose

You'd kept a close

Account:

Amount

Of minutes spent on things

Not

Consequential,

Essential,

Or

Enlightening.

Frightening,

Isn't it?

Time to set alarms,

Perhaps?

Lapse

Back to years

Ago?

No.

You were younger

Then,

When

Time was

Cheap.

Leap

Forward

Toward

A fuller

Life

Rife

With promise,

Minus

Strangulaton.

Elation!

Poetic Exhibit #2: Dream...Beam

Living in a world

Of dreams

Seems

to be nonproductive...

For, though you've spun that web

Yourself,

The

Shelf

You're sitting on

Can be a lonely place,

Space enough for your dreams

Only,

Lonely,

Any way you

Perceive it.

Believe it

Or

Before

You know it,

You'll be flailing,

Wailing

Through an endless

Nightmare,

Where

No one wants to

Be.

See:

A bright pink

Place,

Where the only pretty

Face

Belongs

To you.

True.

But if you want to make a dream

Reality,

Be

Focused

On the path you need to

Take

To make

A vision

Come alive.

Strive

To keep your eye on

The prize.

(Wise men

Recognize

It's

Outside.)

A dream without a destination?

Creation

Denied.

Craft the dream...

Make it

Real.

Feel

The joy of

Watching it

come true.

WHO KNEW?!