Legacy

Perched cross-legged, I gazed with a fixed look
Wide-eyed in wonder as Mom rhymed each line
Bound ‘tween the worn covers of her thick book.
Sweet Mom sounded each word in metered time,
From Longfellow, Foss, and Byron for ages-
For my brother and me, words of sages.

Wide-eyed in wonder as Mom rhymed each line
Of Longfellow, Foss, Byron and yes, Poe!
From paper-thin pages, her light words did rhyme
But her tone changed as she moved on to Poe.
Darkly we heard his poems from her pages
And through his Raven, Poe leapt in rages.

Bound ‘tween the worn covers of her thick book
Raptly, we heard classic poems unfold.
“My favorite,” I begged and she looked,
(Though not knowing what it meant, truth be told)
Then she smiled, turned pages, and uttered one word
“Excelsior!” It was about the sword!

Sweet Mom sounded each word in metered time,
In our long ago, my brother Joe wrote
Deep thoughtful poems that did rarely rhyme.
His deep fishing thoughts, oft penned on a boat
My fledging romance works were hid from sight.
Poetic dances in moon's darkest night.

From Longfellow, Foss, and Byron for ages-
Emerging from those old poets' bellwether
That worn brown book of classic world sages
Influenced our writing work together,
Saved gathered scraps of our writing engages
On WDC, Joe comes alive on pages.

For my brother and me, words of sages.
No more can I hear Mom read a poem
Her works are preserved in writing for ages.
No more my brother; he too has gone home.
Though sad no longer their voices I hear,
Their legacy of words resonates clear.


Poem Update ▼

This was originally "...our clarion legacy"  but I was not pleased with the poem. I re-wrote this to conform to the Trente-Sei form. It tells a story of one of my fondest childhood memories.

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Entry: December 4, 2017
For: The poet's Place Cafe
Form: The Trente-Sei is an intriguing form with a cascading pattern of line repetition. This particular form
is constructed in six stanzas with six lines per stanza and a rhyme/repetition pattern as described and demonstrated in the following link: http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/forums/topic/620-trenta-sei/ .

The elements of the Trenta-sei are:
1. narrative verse, it tells a story.
2. usually written as accentual verse (the rhythm of today's speech) with 5 stressed syllables per line
3. stanzaic, composed of 6 sixains, 36 lines total.
4. rhymed, with the rhyme scheme of a heroic sestet, aB1A1B2C1C2 / B1dbdee / A1fafgg / B2hbhii / C1jcjkk / C2lclmm
5. composed with each line (with the exception of L1) of the first stanza taking its turn as the first line of the following stanzas.

Syllabic Pattern: 10
Rhyme Pattern: aB1A1B2C1C2 / B1dbdee / A1fafgg / B2hbhii / C1jcjkk / C2lclmm