National Poetry Day

I’ve been playing with poetry recently, and since its national poetry day I’m going to pop this one up.

I had written it for a specific competition, but my executive function issues got in the way, and I ended up missing the deadline. Ah well.

It’s an attempt at a Welsh style called a Cynghanedd (Harmony). English doesn’t lend itself well to the form, which is all about mirroring consonant sounds, but I love trying it.

This particular poem is a Cynghanedd Sain (a sound harmony). It’s not perfect, I’ve kept to the spirit of the rules, but bending rules is a huge part of my coping mechanisms!

Each line is broken into three sections, the first must rhyme with the second, the second’s consonants must appear in the same order in the third (but mustn’t rhyme). I find that structure can often push you into new ways of thinking.

Hope you don’t mind my poetic tangent!

Silence

A cacophony of phoney feign

Silence fell, a hell, a haul

Of buzzing, humming, homonyming,

Of croaking, poking, pecking

Of bleating, meeting, mating.

My feet in rivers, slicing shivers, sluicing shy verges.

Lips loose and held, a tongueless weld, tangled, I swallow

Silence batters and clatters. Cultures

Caught in parallel, increasing swell, Encroaching its will

On my emptiness. My moment’s less minimised silence.

Silence. I have never heard a silent herd, slain throats,

A quest for peace, unslayable beast, No syllable boasts

Sleeker vacuum, a perfect plume, pure facet palmed.

With feet asplash, fish flash, fresh flesh.

I lie back, arms slack, roaming slaked.

Winds steal words, steal calling birds, still clinging breeds

Empty vases, passes, peace in pieces.