: Write a glosa. This involves an epigram of 4 consecutive lines from a favorite poet that the challenge participant believes they can write successfully to. Then, write a poem consisting of four 10-line stanzas where the final line of each stanza is a line from the epigram, in order. Within each stanza, lines 6, 9 and 10 must rhyme.
And I have known the eyes already, known them all:-
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,…( Eliot/ The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock )
So It Is
Yes, you and I have walked through the woods and cities
Seen the sun rise and set on paths and deserted streets
Had dinner over the fire and eaten in the finest restaurants
Spent nights in cheap motels and bedrolls on the ground
Heard city streets muttering confusion and woodpecker’s staccato
A time for you, a time for me to consider the question’s call
Time to prepare, to meet, to create, to revise our indecisions
To discuss our visions, dreams and meet our petty tyrants
The ones that watch us from the corners of their eyes and stall
And I have known the eyes already, known them all
We visit the museums and make pseudo comments about Michelangelo
Camp out in National forests to feel closer to our natural savagery
Shall we go and attire ourselves with coat and tie and show our formal selves
Carefully comb our thinning hair, check the mirror and adjust our cufflinks
Drive down those same streets thinking about the people we will meet
I measure my “game face” and reflect on my measured life, a habitable maze
Anticipate the casual voices in mundane conversation filling empty spaces
Fixed frocks, manicured nails, perfume and cologne will fill the air
And then those looks, a jury of peers, maybe wondering about my ways
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase
And shall I say and confess that now I am a poet, an artist with different ways
That I love to paint and write and rhyme and read with poet’s special creeds
Have grown a beard, long hair and study spiritual and metaphysical philosophies
No, I can’t say that I am famous, nor was I meant to be but I experience joy
And I have wept and danced, prayed, seen the world and helped others
I am no prophet, CEO or beggar but can talk to each on level fields within
In this world, like a curious butterfly trying not to be captured in the ooze
I have heard comments of my pretty wings and also called a foolish dreamer
And some still want me in a box, not a free and sovereign spirit but wire to bend
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin
The person in my mirror grows old before my eyes maybe lost a half a step
But I do not fear this changing image for it has been worth every minute
And like Edith Piaf’s song, Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien, I have no regrets
For life is what we make it and we experience what is called good and bad
I have seen the micro make-up of the universe, had visions and prayers answered
Have loved and been loved; been to the gates of Hell and to the top to fall
I pray for worldly peace, Love and joy and know we really are all equal within
But I still fret and wonder, carry out the garbage, wash dishes and sleep
The waves of fate and wind may blow but I will grin and hear the call
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall.
