Be Careful What You Wish For… #Double Nonet

Posted on by Colleen M. Chesebro

I haven’t taken part in my own poetry challenge for a couple of weeks. I’m getting down to the nitty gritty on Word Craft ~ the Art of Crafting Syllabic Poetry and I’m still hunting for a few poetry forms. So, this double nonet will serve as an example to that specific form. I might add… the only example.

Finding poetry examples for the book from your blogs opened my eyes. We all have our favorite forms that we like to write. No surprise there. Some of you have a tendency to only write one form of poetry, that’s it!

I was surprised to learn that many of you had not experimented with the other syllabic poetry forms from the challenge. I hope after last week’s successes with the haibun form that some of you will venture out and try a few more. Who knows? It might inspire you to compile a collection of your poetry into a book!

The Double Nonet

A classic nonet is a nine-line poem, with a syllable count of 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. You can create this form with any number of nine-line stanzas following the original or leave it as a single verse. In my example below, I wrote two separate nine-line stanzas featuring a syllable count of 9/8/7/6/5/4/3/2/1, 9/8/7/6/5/4/3/2/1. However, you could create a double (reversed) nonet with a syllable count of 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9, 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9 syllables per line.

All Double nonet poetry needs a theme to make it cohesive. I like to leave a blank line between the stanzas, but you don’t have to. Write about the things important to you and don’t forget to use vivid descriptions.

In my piece below, in the first stanza, I write about climate change and how I imagine a scenario where the mother goddess (Gaia, or mother earth) brings rain to stop the fires ravaging the earth. While in the second stanza, I explain the consequences of too much rain.

The idea is to compare and contrast two things. There should be some kind of connection between the nonet stanzas.

You can create double haiku, double senryu, double tanka, double gogyohka, double cinquain, double etheree, and double nonet poetry. In fact, any of these forms can become longer poems by adding more stanzas, which is excellent information to know when the poetry contest you want to enter asks for longer poetry. You’ve got this!

Image by My pictures are CC0. When doing composings: from Pixabay

“Be Careful What you Wish for…”

Wind, the calming breath of the goddess
brought moisture to the thirsty earth.
Water, the life source endured
quenched the fires and flames
that stoked climate change
across our lands.
This rebirth
brings us
life.

Storm remnants ebb into silvered mists
where sky and water join as one.
I struggle for air above
the rising ocean tides,
as shrill sea bird screams
welcome me to
a fresh day
without
land.

©2020 Colleen M. Chesebro

Thanks for reading.

28 thoughts on “Be Careful What You Wish For… #Double Nonet”

  5. This is so beautiful and clever all at the same time a stern warning about climate change. I love the money, infact I love all poetry. You never cease to amaze me with your talent and your helpful support of us all. The book sounds so exciting 💜

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  8. We often wish for the truth without the consequences. Vivid imagery.
    And you are right about favorite forms. My default is definitely shadorma. But I like to be challenged to try other things. Perhaps you could challenge us with a different form each week, although not require it. (K)

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    1. Thanks, Kerfe. That’s what I’m thinking. I’m so eclectic with the forms. I know time is an issue for many so a haiku or Senryu sometimes is the safer bet. Good idea, though! 😍❤️

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