Sonnet IV - Jetlag

Sometimes the best way to work with structural rules of poetry is to break them. One of my favorite simple examples of this is Keats' sonnet "On Sitting Down to Read King Lear Once Again." Keats writes a traditional sonnet, albeit with a slightly tweaked rhyme scheme, but on the final line - "Give me new phoenix wings to fly at my desire" - he switches from pentameter to hexameter (in other words, he adds an extra metric foot). The way that Keats broke structure here to underscore the feeling of the final line fascinated me so much that I wrote an entire paper on it... although I don't think my grade was that outstanding, so I could be the only one who feels that way.

In any case, I was inspired during a particularly difficult commercial airline experience to try my own play on structure. While squeezed into the last row of a 747 full of loud people and louder children, unable to sleep and contemplating infanticide, I messed around with a Petrarchan sonnet (I don't even know why, maybe I wanted to embrace the suffering) in iambic tetrameter instead of pentameter. So see if the shorter lines make you feel as crushed an uncomfortable as I was when I wrote them. Also note the alteration of the final line, which I ripped off from Keats. Thanks, John!

Note: Since this is a Petrarchan sonnet, there is some unnecessary angst and sentimentality. It's like a rule.

Sonnet IV: Flight

Inside the screaming metal beast,
The bird that swallows humans whole,
Presses the body and the soul
With each regurgitated feast—
My skin is sore, my bones are creased
And cracked, and travel takes a toll
On bodies broken of control—
To sleep—it’s been a year at least.

My head rolls deathlike on my shoulder;
I’ll find a better way to fly
Or failing that, to fall instead
And as the cycled air turns colder
You’ll be with me against the sky,
Your shoulder soft and warm under my head.

Sonnet III: Good Taste

One rule about the necessary structure of a sonnet (though it isn't always followed) is this: the first eight lines will present a theme or argument, and the next six will begin a change or turn in this argument. It should all be wrapped up, neatly and succinctly, in that final couplet (the last two lines). This structure developed from the original Petrarchan sonnet, which also contained 14 lines but was clearly divided between the first octet (eight lines) and the final sestet (six, good, you're catching on) by it's beastly rhyme scheme.

Why beastly, you ask? Well, Petrach was an Italian, you see, and the Italians cheat at poetry by having a lot more words that rhyme with each other than we do. Which is just linguistically unfair, if you ask me. So if you try to write a Petrarchan sonnet in English, the result is often hilarious as you begin trying to find third and fourth rhymes for the same sound. This wiki sums the form up pretty accurately, if you're curious.

With my sonnet today I attempted to take a clear turn after the first eight lines, from the introduction to the theme into the deeper "metaphor" of the poem (metaphor is in quotation marks because I don't want to claim that this poem is deep, or anything). Extended metaphor, or conceit, is also a tradition in sonnets.

Sonnet III: Seasonal Flavors

There’s something everyday in apple pie,
An old familiar sense of standard fare,
A treat on which pie-eaters can rely
To always be in season, everywhere.

Not so for pumpkin – fickle orange gourd!
A flavor never found outside of Autumn
And ne’er could Shamrock Shakes,* although adored,
Be found past March by customers who sought them.

No longtime lover’s lips could match the taste
Of ephemeral eggnog with a hint
Of nutmeg, or hot chocolate deftly laced
With temporary Christmas peppermint.

Some flavors linger, winter through the fall –
And yet, the sexiest are seasonal.

*For those who may be tragically unaware, the Shamrock Shake is a sort-of minty, delightfully ambiguous green shake served at McDonald's in March, in honor of St. Patrick's Day.