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Today is ‘National Day on writing’ which encourages all of us to face the page and begin… Francisco X. Alarcón did it succinctly with his “The Blank White Page”:

“is a meadow
after a snowfall
that a poem
hopes to cross

And here is Howard Nemrov on “Writing” (I encourage you to click this link and read in full)
 “… so intimately, out there
at the pen’s point or brush’s tip, do world
and spirit wed. The small bones of the wrist
balance against great skeletons of stars
exactly; the blind bat surveys his way
by echo alone. Still, the point of style
is character. The universe induces
a different tremor in every hand, from the
check-forger’s to that of the Emperor
Hui Tsung, who called his own calligraphy
the ‘Slender Gold.’ A nervous man
writes nervously of a nervous world, and so on.”

And once the creative ink is flowing, we can turn to today’s MTB prompt which is The Roundabout – a 20-line poem (attributed to David Edwards) because of course today is the 20th!

“The roundabout is a metered stanzaic form with a simple but unusual premise that the rhyme scheme should come full circle (thus the name).” Word Wool

Here are the rules and structure:

  • Four quintains (five-line stanzas) for a total of twenty lines
  • Iambic meter throughout
  • Lines have 4;3;2;2;3 feet respectively
  • Line 5 repeats line 2
  • Rhyme scheme is aBccB bCddC cDaaD dAbbA

This is “Crash” from David Edwards – the inventor of this style

“Around around the carousel
across the circles face
we cry we shout
we crash about
across the circles face  

and ever always breakneck pace
by this unending route
and twists and turns
and breaks and burns
by this unending route

of ever always in and out
the yearling quickly learns
to run and yell
at ocean’s swell
the yearling quickly learns

to run and leap and then he earns
but he will never tell
there’s not a chase
that wins the race
but he will never tell.”

Once you have published your poem, add it to the Mr Linky below. Then go visiting other contributors as that is half the enjoyment of our dVerse gatherings.