dew drop in 2023

I Don't Do Shakespearian Sonnets

April 23—Incorporate Shakespeare In Some Way

I wrote my first poem
In 1971
When I was 15.

And have written thousands
Of poems since then
Now I am close to 70.

But during all these years
There is one poetical form
I have only attempted once.

And that attempt
To write a Shakespearean sonnet
Was just lame.

And I have written
Several COVID sonnets
Which were invented
During the COVID pandemic

Shakespearean sonnets
Just don’t work for me
Just can’t hear
the iambic pentameter meter.

Although I can get
the rhyming scheme down.

Wish there was
An online poetic meter dictionary
Don’t know why
Someone has not come up
With that.

I can’t hear traditional meter patterns
Perhaps because I grew up with
Severe learning disability
Half blind and half deaf

With a severe speech impediment
Did not speak properly
Until the 3rd grade
After years of speech therapy

And so perhaps
I just can’t hear
The iambic pentameter
Or other meter based Poems
Which I generally avoid.

But the Burns Sonnet
Like a Shakespearean sonnet
But without the iambic pentameter
That sounds like a form I can do.

They say Burns wrote sonnets
In this way
Because as a Scotsman
With a thick accent

He could never hear
Iambic petameter
So he wrote his sonnets
Ignoring meter.

That inspires me
To try my hand
At a Burns sonnet.