Here comes Rosa Nagle again:
For me, it's the former. Choose your form carefully. I say this because I've worked over the last three days on a Villanelle for the 30 poems in 30 days challenge. It's up as part of the 30/30 finally, and it's only the fifth poem this month because I didn't want to work on anything else until I finished this. It was an aggravating journey.
In this case, the form dictated my poem's content. It reminded me of when I was younger and would have a poem that didn't seem to have a direction. I would put it in a specific form that would force it to take a direction. For the villanelle I just wrote, I had a germ of an idea that might have been ruined because I came up with the idea the same time I wanted to challenge myself with a villanelle. Might have been the wrong move, but that's the risk you take. And if the idea's good enough, it can survive to be in another poem.
I can't dwell on poems this month any more than I already have if I want to finish this month's challenge, so I didn't go back and change the initial rhyme words. But I really should have. "More" and "before" as refrain "A" rhymes might have worked, but starting he "B" rhyme with "odd" (and repeating the same word in another stanza) was my biggest mistake in writing this. Only changing my refrain rhymes to "mud" and "dud" with the B rhyme starting with "dumb" would have given me a bigger challenge.
The only other solution would have been switching this to free verse, though this poem seems to melded to this form and wouldn't survive by itself in the current state it's in. Maybe I'll feel better about it next week.
The only thing I can suggest to authors who wonder about form vs. content is to write in form as often as you can. After a while, you can feel like you're exercising control over a form rather than letting it control you. I can actually have fun with haikus and bring the ideas from those small bits into longer poems. Limericks have been good to me over the last year. I've written enough sonnets that I'm comfortable enough to give them a go every now and then. Tretinas (see my first 30/30 poem this month for an example of the form) I love trying out because my first one ever turned out so well and landed in a good place. Villanelles, well see above. Sestinas, well, see villanelles. Pantoums scare me, but I really want to try one.
And now, so I can completely dwell on this, I end with an alternative villanelle:
They try to throw your name into the mud
thrown amongst those deadbeaten and dumb,
your reputation floundering like a dud
Rumors grind like cow's teeth on a cud
and wears you downto make all feeling numb
when they try to throw your name into the mud.
They will be heard, they'll cut you with their crud
until your good name's fed to sharks like chum,
your reputation floating like a dud.
Each story is a smelly little bud,
it's plant a branch with sticky gum
that grab your name and keep it in the mud
and cut you so it mixes with your blood
and cuts, you go and take your thumb
and stop the bleeding, sitting like a dud.
And they say hey, just go and pull your pud,
with your hand full of sap and dirt on your bum.
They try to throw your name into the mud,
your reputation floundering like a dud.
Cop out disclaimer: The poems written to accompany these questions are "extras" in my National Poetry Writing Month 30-poems-in-30 days challenge and might not necessarily be dazzling, able to stand on their own, or even any good.
Does the style of a poem determine its content, or does the content of a poem determine the style?
For me, it's the former. Choose your form carefully. I say this because I've worked over the last three days on a Villanelle for the 30 poems in 30 days challenge. It's up as part of the 30/30 finally, and it's only the fifth poem this month because I didn't want to work on anything else until I finished this. It was an aggravating journey.
In this case, the form dictated my poem's content. It reminded me of when I was younger and would have a poem that didn't seem to have a direction. I would put it in a specific form that would force it to take a direction. For the villanelle I just wrote, I had a germ of an idea that might have been ruined because I came up with the idea the same time I wanted to challenge myself with a villanelle. Might have been the wrong move, but that's the risk you take. And if the idea's good enough, it can survive to be in another poem.
I can't dwell on poems this month any more than I already have if I want to finish this month's challenge, so I didn't go back and change the initial rhyme words. But I really should have. "More" and "before" as refrain "A" rhymes might have worked, but starting he "B" rhyme with "odd" (and repeating the same word in another stanza) was my biggest mistake in writing this. Only changing my refrain rhymes to "mud" and "dud" with the B rhyme starting with "dumb" would have given me a bigger challenge.
The only other solution would have been switching this to free verse, though this poem seems to melded to this form and wouldn't survive by itself in the current state it's in. Maybe I'll feel better about it next week.
The only thing I can suggest to authors who wonder about form vs. content is to write in form as often as you can. After a while, you can feel like you're exercising control over a form rather than letting it control you. I can actually have fun with haikus and bring the ideas from those small bits into longer poems. Limericks have been good to me over the last year. I've written enough sonnets that I'm comfortable enough to give them a go every now and then. Tretinas (see my first 30/30 poem this month for an example of the form) I love trying out because my first one ever turned out so well and landed in a good place. Villanelles, well see above. Sestinas, well, see villanelles. Pantoums scare me, but I really want to try one.
And now, so I can completely dwell on this, I end with an alternative villanelle:
They try to throw your name into the mud
thrown amongst those deadbeaten and dumb,
your reputation floundering like a dud
Rumors grind like cow's teeth on a cud
and wears you downto make all feeling numb
when they try to throw your name into the mud.
They will be heard, they'll cut you with their crud
until your good name's fed to sharks like chum,
your reputation floating like a dud.
Each story is a smelly little bud,
it's plant a branch with sticky gum
that grab your name and keep it in the mud
and cut you so it mixes with your blood
and cuts, you go and take your thumb
and stop the bleeding, sitting like a dud.
And they say hey, just go and pull your pud,
with your hand full of sap and dirt on your bum.
They try to throw your name into the mud,
your reputation floundering like a dud.
Cop out disclaimer: The poems written to accompany these questions are "extras" in my National Poetry Writing Month 30-poems-in-30 days challenge and might not necessarily be dazzling, able to stand on their own, or even any good.
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