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Poem # 118 - Fun with Poetic Form Series - the lazy poet’s sestina
fly David Angel Poem # 118 - Fun with Poetic Form Series - the lazy poet’s sestina I no more claim to be an artist Than I claim to be a poet I am but a humble navel gazer Slave to vision, stargazer Admire the real artist Long to be a real poet! Camera in hand, poet A rune, a bird, a ladder gazer Lune or seer, artist? Artist snapped a picture which the poet put to words - for dreamers, birders, gazers Copyright ©️ 2026, David Angel, All Rights Reserved PoetNote - Tritina A distant cousin and poor relation of the sestina, the meager tritina is a much easier form to master than its illustrious cuz. It contains three tercets and a final line for a total of ten lines. (A tercet has three lines for the vocabularily challenged. The entire poem has ten lines for the mathematically challenged.) In each tercet, the final word of each line is repeated in a pattern. The words do not have to rhyme. Deposit one bitcoin into my account and I will reveal the pattern…. Thank you. It’s 1/2/3. 3/1/2. 2/3/1. The envoi (last line) uses all three words in the order of 1/2/3. The tritina is a modern form which considers the sestina to be showoffy and verbose. It Angel - You can stop, you had me at "easier" PoetNote - Poetryschool. com does a really nice job comparing and contrasting the villanelle, the sestina and the tritina. "Certain repetitive verse forms, such as the villanelle and sestina, have been part of our poetic toolkit for centuries. George Szirtes talks of the sense of ‘community’ a poet feels when working in a traditional form; for me it’s like walking along a footpath which is familiar, well-worn, but in the end, the destination is never the same. Szirtes says that the ‘community is, by its nature, a community of ghosts’. In that statement is the ambition to keep form alive (and for each generation to bring new ideas) but sometimes the presence of all those other ghostly poets littering the footpath can be a burden as well as an incentive. It’s useful to remember that the villanelle and sestina were created for musical accompaniment; inherent in the form is the notion of chorus or refrain. But the refrain better be worth repeating, otherwise the poem predictable, static. In the case of the villanelle, each of the 2 refrain lines is repeated 4 times in the space of 19 lines. In the case of the sestina, the poet must select 6 strong words, each to be repeated 7 times, and keep them moving naturally through the poem, which must keep going, out of necessity, for 39 lines. A lot of sestinas run out of steam around the stanza (where most good ones attempt to make a turn). I quote a well-known poet, who says that ‘life is too short for the sestina’. I have to say I agree; there are very few that don’t outstay their welcome. Of course there is, in any poem, the tension between what you want to say and how to structure it; sometimes the form can defeat the intention. So how do you utilise the interesting constraints that a villanelle or a sestina provide without feeling straightjacketed by them? This is a great age of poetic improvisation, where new forms are being invented by poets who like the challenge of formal structure but want the freedom to make their own rules (in other words, to stray off the path); all in the spirit of continuing traditions, but revitalising them and adapting them to our modern voices. The American poet Marie Ponsot invented the tritina, which she describes as the square root of the sestina. Instead of six repeated words, you choose three, which appear at the end of each line in the following sequence: 123, 312, 231; there is a final line, which acts as the envoi, which features all three words in the order they appeared in the first stanza. So the poem is structured as three tercets and one single line in conclusion. There is often a turn between the ninth and tenth lines, which gives the tritina similar properties to the sonnet. Ponsot says that poetic forms like the tritina are ‘instruments of discovery. The forms create an almost bodily pleasure in the poet. What you’re doing is trying to discover. They are not restrictive. They pull things out of you. They help you remember.' " - poetryschool. com Perchtography by David Angel Cici - Your point? Angel - You used to love me. You scientists are so literal. I’ll walk you through it because I love you Look at picture one
The scientist sees a ladder and gets back to work The ladder matter is never given a single thought let alone a second thought But there are worlds inside worlds - symbology inside ladders The artist has to risk seven years bad luck and is compelled to walk under the ladder and cast her gaze up She is then compelled to envision herself climbing that dangerous device to the top and standing tall on the highest perch, arms outstretched and readying herself to takeoff into the uncertain night She knows there is only the illusion of safety in reticence. She also knows she is in no real danger because she is in her dream body which can soar like an eagle or an angel Then, of course, she has to position her camera on the floor under the ladder and snap a picture Look at picture two
It is at that moment she suspects the bird! She zooms in and plays with the contrast & colors until she can see its plumage more precisely Look at and see picture three
She knows she too could be the bird one day if only… if only she could… Cici - I get it now... title allusion
Angel - Feeling a need to share the profundity of her experience, the artist spends her next couple hours in solitude writing, prepping, cropping and finally printing, all the time knowing she will consider herself blessed if one or two (or if good fortune knocks, three) artists see her picture poem and understand her vision and her longing The Fun with Poetic Form Series: #1 When Her Poetry is Good #2 Bad, Poetry, Society, #3 Hard Pass on Poetry Contests #4 Living Yesterday #5 When Poetry Inspires Rhyme #6 Appetence for Poetry #7 Free Poetry & Worth Every Cent #8 Patchwork Poetry #9 First Stab at a Senryū #10 Of the Ether #11 When Allegory Inspires Rhyme #12 On Poetic Form and the Value of Time #13 Limerick #14 Better than God #15 Professor of Poetry #16 A Mouthful of Hendecasyllables #17 Write to Win #18 The Ontology of Poetry #19 "Express Dick," Learn Siri! #20 Placento - the "Cento" #21 The Slave of Poetic Duty #22 Birth of the "Lowku" #23 Why Dimeter has Four Syllables per Line #24 They're Just Dead Leaves - the Villanelle # 25 (a-e) - the Haiku Breakup Haikus Om Haiku Haiku Contest - Subject: The Future Alpha-Bit "Haikus" Haikus of Hope #26 Short Poet Society - Short Poets #27 I Mean Like Fortune Cookies Sonnet #28 (a-d) - the Ekphrastic poem - Hidden Meaning Speak No Evil’s All Too Short Love Affair with See No Evil’s Wife The Rift Between the Wall Did the Princess Lose her Pet? #29 (a-e) - Love Lost Series - a. Limerick b. Haiku c. Sijo d. Sonnet e. Blank verse #30 Egghead "Poetry" #31 Blunt Instruments - On words #32 On Gleaning Meaning from a Poem and The Four Questions # 33 The Lune #34 The Evil Genie Said "Choose!" # 35 Feather and Chain - The "Decrescendo" # 36 Walkin' the DOGE - Political Satire #37 The Second Coming? - Rap # 38 Prosody for Dum-dums # 39 The ABCs of Gloating - The Rhyme Scheme #40 Fluckmeter Sonnet #41 Breaking the Tomatometer # 42 Erasing Erasure Eyewash # 43 The Trump FUKKU # 44 Can't Stop Rimming # 45 Sell No Rhyme Before It's Time - The Slant Rhyme # 46 The Free Verse Curse - Vers Libre # 47 Postmark BFE - The Prompt # 48 Soft Spot for Animals - On Inspiration # 49 Pita and Circuses - Satire # 50 The Vomitcratic Party - Free Verse #51 Wood You Like More "Haikus?" - The "Funku" # 52 - A Good Geek'll Do That - Write it down or lose it! # 53 - Aerodynamics of Flight - Evolution of a Poem #54 - London Bridge is Falling Down Haiku - The Renga #55 - The Desaltery - Poetic License #56 - Dumbwasteoftimedoh - The Rondeau #57 - Yes It Does! - The Slant Rhyme #58 - Temptation Sonnet - The Angelspearean Sonnet #59 - A Poet Worth Her Salt - Write Only from the Heart # 60 - The Enquirer - Literary Criticism for English Minors # 61 - Storge: Not Exactly My Plan - The Acrostic Poem # 62 - Two Wings to Fly - The Parable # 63 - Rimshot - Satire vs. Parody # 64 - Night School of the Fine Art - Alliteration # 65 - A Lune to Make You Swoon # 66 - Feeling Like a Dead Duck - Slant Rhyme for the Third Time #67 - AABBA - More Pathetic Limericks #68 - Prayer Time! - The Dizain #69 - Ain't Got that Shwing - The Free Verse Limerick #70 - Worse than Light Verse - Death by Gingivitis #71 - LimTrumpericks - Fit for a King! A New Limerick Form is Born #72 - Good & Hard - The Homophone # 73 - Countdown to Zoharanistan: A Hendecasyllabic Lament #74 - The Drunku #75 - Fifty-two Times Easier - The Prime 1 is Born! # 76 - Cracking / the Prime 1 Code #77 - Eleven Places Not to Fly to Because (Hendecasyllabic fun) #78 - Old Resentments Never Die, They Just Fade Away - Free Association # 79 - Happy National Nookie Day, Everyone! - Finding Your Groove #80 - Hey Good Buddy, Handle's "Messiah" - The Fourteener #81 - Dueling Diets Sonnet - The Hybrid Sonnet #82 - What's New... - The Liposong #83 - Sydney - The Triolet # 84 - One More Week of Spring - Another Triolet # 85 - Three Rehashed Villanesques #86 - Third Night Sestina #87 - Jesus, Enough Enjambments Already! #88 - Twisted Tie Rods - two more triolets #89 - Worst Wights in the Whole Wide World - Anaphora, Alliteration & Aardvark Words #90 - The Scrounge - The "DUOlet" #91 - "How Did You Escape Trump, Supreme Leader?" "I Ran" - The Twelve to One #92 - Don't Disdain Me Dizain - Another Dizain, Yawn #93 - Wet Horse - The Caesura #94 - But We Can't Afford to Fly to Florida, Hon! - Why published formats of the same famous poem are so different #95 - 17 Days 'til Groundhog's Day -Long Winter Calls for Long Lines #96 - Why I Write Like This - Acrostic Amusement #97 - It Will Always Be the Fault of Minnesota Politicians & Media Scum - A Haiku variant - the Noemku #98 - Bring a Gun to a Gun Fight? - The Terza Rima # 99 - My Little Slice of Americana - The Quatrain #100 - God of Fertility - Anaphoric Acrostic Fun! #101 - Still Hope - AI ain't No Substitute for the HUMAN Writer (Yet?) # 102 - X-ed Out - The Concrete Poem # 103 - Risk Off - The Pantoum # 104 - Reach Around - Metaphor # 105 - Teach Us a Cool Rhyme Scheme, Abba! - The Envelope Rhyme #106 - Pushing the Envelope - ABBA #107 - Pantomb Pantoum - Power of Repetition #108 - Poetry Goddess Unadorned - Constrained Form #109 - Michicken Winter - The Visual Poem #110 - Tom Jones Wrote that Shite, Not Me! - When Enjambment Gets You in a Jam # 111 - Dwarfs, Kisses, Heaven - The Tritina # 112 - He Must Be Stopped at All Cost or the World Will End - Dodecasyllabic verse #113 - She Has It Together - A-a-acrostic Poem #114 - Sorry Chief, I'm Shutting You Down, Find Something Else to Do - The Fourteener #115 - French Ticker - Oulipo, Concrete or Both # 116 - Unemployed Silver Fox Sonnet - More Hendecasyllabic Fun #117 - Travesty at a Dunkin' in Duluth Dizain (GA not MN) # 118 - fly - the lazy poet's sestina