Incremental Poetry ~ 34 Lines

Duke

Duke
came to
us last week
and changed our world

he’s a friendly sort
but I prefer quiet fish
secretly I make a wish
his time will be short

don’t get me wrong
I don’t want
him to
die
just to
move on when
our son moves on

see, he’s Bobby’s dog
I’m merely the “grandmother”
waiting grands of another
sort to come someday

the nest is full
it’s almost
time for
him
to fly
and build his
own nest nearby

or far away, if
away is where life leads him
I only hope love speeds him
home from time to time

and when he comes
I hope he’ll
bring his
dog

Copyright © 2019 Abigail Gronway – All Rights Reserved

Welcome to my series, Incremental Poetry, where each week the featured poem will be one line longer than the one I share the week before. I have no idea how long I’ll keep this up, so we’ll just have to wait and see. Thank you for stopping by.

Scansion:
Arkquain Swirl
created by Madison Shaw, aka Arkbear on AllPoetry.com

An Arkquain is a 12-line poem comprised of 3 quatrains, with the syllabic structure
1-2-3-4, 5-7-7-5, 4-3-2-1 and a rhyme scheme of Axxx xbbx xxxA.

An Arkquain String is a series of 3 Arkquains.

An Arkquain Swirl is basically a segmented/augmented Arkquain String.
Where two stanzas meet at 1-syllable lines, drop one of the lines and the space between the stanzas, forming a 7-line symmetrical stanza.
The rhyme scheme will also change: the 7-syllable lines will continue to rhyme, but none of the others.
Total length: 34 lines
Syllabic structure:
1-2-3-4,
5-7-7-5,
4-3-2-1-2-3-4,
5-7-7-5,
4-3-2-1-2-3-4,
5-7-7-5,
4-3-2-1
Rhyme scheme: xxxx xaax xxxx xxxx xbbx xxxx xxxx xccx xxxx
Must be centered.
Try to use words of similar length so your lines form a nice curve. I did my best above, but there are some imperfections. I improved upon my original draft, but perhaps another look some months from now, after it has rested a while, will improve it even more.

My Dear Readers

The first weekend of March I will be at my very first juried art show! That said, the next couple weeks will be dedicated to the studio, with less time given to my blogs. I will check in from time to time, but please excuse me if it takes a little while to answer comments. Thank you so much for reading! I’ll be back!