5.09.2012

stolen sonnets (the rules & first 3)


stolen sonnets

how to steal a sonnet:

1. each line in the sonnet is a verse line from a poem by another poet

2. anything written in verse is eligible as a source; this includes translations; any verse poem may be used, irrespective of its period, formal approach, etc.

3. any punctuation that appears at the end of the line (in its original context) may be dropped (or not); any punctuation within the line must be retained; punctuation may be added to the ends of lines

4. capitalization may be retained or not, added or not, ad libitum

5. two contiguous lines can be by the same source-poet, but not from the same poem

6. the title of the sonnet, if any, need not be taken from a source text

7. the poet should endeavor to forget where the sonnet’s lines came from as quickly as she can





1. expertise

the forces of irrational concrete
form from gathered god
that day he didn’t get laid
all around me grey rain beat

after some haunted migratory years
melting and opening underfoot
destruction of countries, all souls downward set
behind the bars

still songs to be sung on the other side
contending for the upper hand
lifted you out with a gesture
of the idiom idiotic to restless shudder
on a crocodile rode by
and wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command





2. aberrant

love bites and stings me through, to see
the senate of tyrants: they sunk prone—
it would open up, as a wound
by dint of my deadly

too many staves have splintered the toy
they stand apart in the world
both sheaf and word—
a certain crumb which sticks in my throat today

lead them on if at all bonds cruel;
we came to a plain whose soil repels all roots;
you are asleep;
later thruout the house he ruled
undulates nude,
would never be believed




3. skeletal support

known circumference attached to a frame
singin the blues of street signs
i delight in choosing only in my mind
these hurt us indeed, and in vain

i have made fins from bluejays’ wings
when i dragged the rotten log
like a thin twig
with the burning

we roamed, we boys from high school
the mists, that roll and rise
but showed no trace of alcohol
as one that is strong in the bushes of his eyes;
the frost sets a brittle stillness on the pool
turning it on either side

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