You are currently viewing Day 27: NaPoWriMo 2024–Opt Out of An American Sonnet

Day 27: NaPoWriMo 2024–Opt Out of An American Sonnet

Day Twenty-Seven on APRIL 27, 2024

A very happy twenty-seventh day of Na/GloPoWriMo to you all.

Today, our featured daily participant is Peregrine Buffington, where you’ll not only find a lot of alliteration,
consonance, and assonance in response to Day 26’s prompt, but you’ll find it in abecedarian form.

Our featured resource for the day is Poetry Pause, the “daily dispatch” of the League of Canadian Poets.

And now for our prompt – optional, as always!  Today we’d like to challenge you to
write an “American sonnet.”
What’s that? Well, it’s like a regular sonnet but . . . fewer rules?
Like a traditional Spencerian or Shakespearean sonnet,
an American sonnet is shortish (generally 14 lines, but not necessarily!), discursive, and tends to en
with a bang, but there’s no need to have a rhyme scheme or even a specific meter. Here are a few examples:

If you’d like more specific instructions for how to get started, Write 253 has a great “formula” prompt
for an American sonnet, which you can find here.

Happy writing!

A HAIGA SLIDESHOW

  • haiga
  • haiga

All words, all images, all sweat © selma


…Thanks for being here as I worked on these first drafts this month.
It has been amazing!! Thanks, Maureen.
Happy last days of NaPoWriMo 2024.
God willing, I’ll see you all here again next year.

MISCELLANEOUS

                              MY TWO POETRY BOOKS

Krakow Nights

I like best the autumn days
when the windows fog over with steam
and the house delights in smells
of anise, cinnamon, and cumin.

When the boys return home from school
lugging bags that deform their small bodies
over starving stomachs that expand
with every footstep they take through the door.

The man-sized bags slide off their shoulders
and the excitement in their voices
bounces off whitewashed kitchen walls,
then soon after, we hear the car stop.

And we see feet walk through the same door,
dragging a face that lights up the room.
Then as I turn the chops, I say,
“three minutes guys, three more minutes,”

And I sprinkle a coat of Krakow Nights
and Dill Weed—both, and as I toss the chops
I turn to him, smiling, and he smiles back
Krakow Night!—I love the autumn too.

*

In The Shadow of Rainbows:
A Collection of Songs of Presence
(GOODREADS)
Published by: Experiments in Fiction
Cover photograph: Kathryn A. LeRoy


***

Non-Fiction Fiction

Carbon footprints
Measure the weight
Of daily deeds
Unplug, switch off
Think mindfulness
Think CO2
Think—
Green energy

*


Poetry Treasures 4: In Touch with Nature –
(GOODREADS)
Compiled and Edited by Kaye Lynne Booth
Cover design by Teagan R. Genevieve

***

THANK YOU FOR CARING

Selma Martin
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This Post Has 24 Comments

  1. Sadje

    Lovely poetry, accompanied with beautiful photos

    1. Selma Martin

      Sadje, I’m pleased to know you liked them. Bless you, dear one.

      1. Sadje

        You’re welcome my friend

  2. rajkkhoja

    Nice poem, Selma. Beautiful qutoe with flower photos.

      1. rajkkhoja

        Welcome, Selma! My pleasure 😊

      1. byngnigel

        Thank you Ms Selma. Hope you are well my dear. Same to you. 💜

  3. memadtwo

    Brevity can convey so much more than wordiness at times. Great haiku. (K)

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