I'm just going to come right out and say it. I hate sonnets. I sort of hate poems. I'm trying to channel that into writing 3 wonderful, pithy sonnets. (It isn't quite going as well as I hoped, but there's still time!)
Ted Berrigan's XV sonnet was confusing, but once I figured it out, I loved it. There is hardly anything more fun than playing around with words and lines like that. One thing I noticed that wasn't mentioned in class is that the poem seemed to have an hourglass shape, like Marilyn Monroe. Perhaps that is why he rearranged the lines, in addition to the collage effect? To make it look like Marilyn Monroe.
Heather McHugh poem "And What Do You Get" is all about wordplay. Some are obvious, like "Or from example, take the ex out: now it's bigger," but "take in out of mind and you've got someone who delivers you a bill" took me a moment to decipher.
I think I will write my sonnets mostly according to the Shakespearean form. I felt that Berrigan's sonnets could hardly be considered sonnets, but what do I know? 14 lines is 14 lines. Still, I feel like I need a little direction here, and using that rhyming structure and (maybe, if I can make it work!) iambic pentameter will give me some place to jump off from.
great.
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