ㅁ Kiamon tried to retrieve her lost soul, searching the forest and hunting a role. Slowly her hope drained away, till at last, Only a ghost trod the earth. She had passed.
– a quatrain in dactylic tetrameter
Category: Couplets and Quatrains
Caveat: Poem #1355 “Fourteenth stanza”
ㅁ Kiamon went on refusing to fight, peering around in an eerie half-light, kicking at dirt and escaping her friends: heartless and actually seeking her end.
– a quatrain in dactylic tetrameter
Caveat: Poem #1352 “Thirteenth stanza”
ㅁ Kiamon drifted, as drifters will drift, taking in scenery, hoping for lift. Nothing appeared, though, and life carried on. Sighing, she wandered... evading the dawn.
– a quatrain in dactylic tetrameter
Caveat: Poem #1342 “The deck is stacked in time’s favor”
ㅁ The trees put up resistance, fighting time with outspread branches. Still, old time will win.
– a couplet in blank verse (iambic pentameter)
Caveat: Poem #1319 “In the present moment, summer cannot happen”
ㅁ Snow appeared and patches, blue and gray, bestrode the heavens. Trees began to doubt there'd be a future warmed in springtime.
– a couplet in “fourteeners” (trochaic heptameter)
Caveat: Poem #1298 “A quatrain in rain”
ㅁ Rain is a pain that will come with more rain. Rain entrains forces that manifest rain. Rain dissolves everything, draining to rain. Rain entertains these quatrains about rain.
– a quatrain in rain (dactylic tetrameter)
Caveat: Poem #1296 “Twelfth stanza”
Kiamon never once thought on her fate, seeking instead to descend to debate topics that really could not set her free, causing her anguish and hiding the key.
– a quatrain in dactylic tetrameter
Caveat: Poem #1287 “A portrait of the world outside”
Clouds glow in purple, in orange and in gray. Morning's vast dome made of blue frames the day. Fragments of snow show persistence through time. Forming strange shapes beside trees lined with rime.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1271 “The cormorant”
There's the gray cormorant sitting out there where the cold rain just submits to its stare. Sideways it glances back up at my gaze - startled, it launches and flies off a ways.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1270 “Mere cartography”
Worlds are constructed of lines and of nodes laid out in patterns depicting abodes. Slowly relations take form and appear: complex creations, and nothing is mere.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1268 “Eleventh stanza (bis)”
"Great," he said - demons will talk in such ways, staking out claims on precarious days. Trust isn't easy with creatures like that. Souls are in question, beliefs are at bat.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1261 “Through a glass darkly”
Orchards of rain were all clinging to hills. Grids wrought distractions in minds seeking thrills. Aimless distortions wove complex designs, Crafted bold icons with broad, blue-green lines.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1259 “Ode to the wood”
Down with all gravel! The weathered wood's fine. Moss on the ground and the trees make a line. Slugs will cavort on the edges of light. Prowling young bears will explore in the night.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1258 “Angst”
Carpeted spaces presented themselves. Books turned their spines out from rickety shelves. Elderly sadnesses lingered and sang. Pains were unbearable. Distant bells rang.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1256 “To ground”
Out on a snow-covered roof there are beasts pawing the whiteness and gazing out east. Loves are discarded and laying around: just random snowflakes all swirling to ground.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1255 “Surreality II”
Faces presented angelic desires. Hallways distorted by unburning fires wove eldrich patterns and fell into stairs, vast nameless oceans, their clouds like pink flares.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1254 “Surreality I”
Palaces spread out their structural souls, greenery covering possible holes. Paintings were hanging on external walls. Darkness, semantic, beclouded the halls.
– a pair of rhymed tetrameter couplets
Caveat: Poem #1199 “Eleventh stanza”
Kiamon sometimes would ponder her fate, doubtless compelled by her path not quite straight, zigging and zagging through storm and through dust, barely aware of her growing disgust.
– a rhymed pair of tetrameter couplets, continuing the introspections of Kiamon, a fictional being.
Caveat: Poem #1198 “Tenth stanza”
Kiamon never paid heed to her fate, still it caught up to her, blanking her slate: sands of the desert, they cradled her head, fallen and hurt, the sun left her for dead.
– a rhymed pair of tetrameter couplets, continuing the introspections of Kiamon, a fictional being.
Caveat: Poem #1195 “Ninth stanza”
Kiamon never paid heed to her fate, battling through time was her gods-given trait, battles were all waged against demons and saints, ethics neglected, devoid of constraints.
– a rhymed pair of tetrameter couplets, continuing the introspections of Kiamon, a fictional being.
Caveat: Poem #1194 “Eighth stanza”
Kiamon never paid heed to her fate, rather she tended to loiter and wait, loathing decisions she wandered the streets, dreaming solutions, accepting defeats.
– a rhymed pair of tetrameter couplets, continuing the introspections of Kiamon, a fictional being.
Caveat: Poem #1179 “Seventh stanza”
Kiamon never once thought on her fate Lacking the judgment to enter that gate Wishing her doubts weren't well-founded in life Pushing to find resolution in strife.
– a rhymed pair of tetrameter couplets, continuing the introspections of Kiamon, a fictional being.
Caveat: Poem #1178 “Sixth stanza”
Kiamon never paid heed to her fate Wrecking the present and blanking her slate, Forcing her gaze toward the glowering moon Over the trees. But the end came too soon.
– a rhymed pair of tetrameter couplets, continuing the introspections of Kiamon, a fictional being.
Caveat: Poem #1177 “Fifth stanza”
Kiamon sometimes would ponder her fate Entering into a strange mental state During which everything seemed like a dream Where dreams themselves were the dominant theme.
– a rhymed pair of tetrameter couplets, continuing the introspections of Kiamon, a fictional being.
Caveat: Poem #1176 “Fourth stanza”
Kiamon never once thought on her fate Everyone thought that she ended up late, Actually, though, she'd been merely a ghost, Time healed her wounds. She returned to her post.
– a rhymed pair of tetrameter couplets, on a certain theme first taken up almost two years ago.
Caveat: Poem #834 “Mood shift”
ㅁ Phrases slip out and envelop the air hanging and swirling across small divides so, in that way they embrace the despair slowly arriving like foam on the tides
– a quatrain in dactylic tetrameter.
Caveat: Poem #720 “잘가”
ㅁ 매미들은 "잘가" 노래했다. 그러서 눈물을 머금었다.
– a free-form poem. The Korean translates, roughly, as “The cicadas sang farewell / so [my eyes] shed tears.”
Caveat: Poem #684 “Non sequitur”
ㅁ Words fumble for the exit but fall down. Time unrolls like rain-laden dark gray clouds.
– a couplet of indeterminate pentameter.
Caveat: Poem #635 “Kodha”
ㅁ There are no words that can justify anger anger distorts all the words, and they must follow like servants who carry their masters' burdens unwillingly, trampling trust.
– a quatrain in dactylic tetrameter.
Caveat: Poem #623 “Third stanza”
Kiamon never once thought on her fate Episodes happened that sometimes did grate: Cruelty is not something done without need... Cut with a blade, then, the soul can be freed.
[daily log: walking, 7.5km]
Caveat: Poem #618 “Second stanza”
Kiamon never once thought on her fate
Gamely she played along, planning to wait
Patience came easy when dreams were all clear
Doubts never showed themselves; neither did fear.
Caveat: Poem #608 “First stanza”
Kiamon never once thought on her fate
Grimly she battled to push down her hate
Hoping perhaps to at last find her goal
Kiamon willingly gave up her soul.
…Recently I tried something new. As some of you know, I have a rather wide set of “novels in progress,” none of which actually progress, much. I’m bad at these wider, longer-scale projects. So I decided to take this slightly more successful short poem-a-day concept and “hijack” it for the novel thing. I have been writing little “character-building” quatrains, where I try to encapsulate some aspect of a story’s character. This is one of those. In general, don’t be surprised to see the names of fictional beings begin to populate some of my poems.
[daily log: walking, 1km]
Caveat: Poem #485
A poem is like a conversation where you hurl your words out slow and there's no end.
This is my new poem-numbering scheme. I decided I wanted the numbers to reflect the total number since I started this poem-a-day effort. So it is the sum of Nonnets + Englynion + Quatrains + Random Poems – [poems written before I started the daily challenge but got included in the earlier counts]. There may be some inaccuracy because some of the quatrains got counted as multiple quatrains despite being single “poems.” Not that all this really matters. I just… decided I wanted to do it like this, moving forward.