Over the last couple of months, we’ve been playing with poetic forms. First, we stripped poems back to a single vowel; then we attempted poems built from a constant string of letters, shifting the spaces between words to alter their meaning; and now we’ve invited members to create poetic palindromes: poems containing the same words in the same order, but which work in either direction, with only the punctuation changing. As always, we are following 26’s old motto: Constraints liberate.
Can these limitations and challenges open up unexpected avenues of meaning?
Julia Webb-Harvey
1.
Adoring eyes widen
‘Sweet love’
Neck strains closer
‘Perfection’
Sighs Narcissus
Narcissus sighs,
‘Perfection’
Closer, strains neck
‘Love… sweet.’
Widen eyes, adoring.
2.
Who am I?
Endlessly gazing
Between land and sea
Shifting horizons
I am lost.
Lost, am I
Horizons shifting
Sea and land, between –
Gazing endlessly
Am I? Who?
Chloe Green
Light switches:
birth and death,
feeling of skin.
Unwinding night –
Silence’s vigil.
Vigil silences –
night unwinding.
Skin of feeling,
death and birth:
switches light.
Max Parfitt
I watch.
Seeing not, but looking.
Love shown I’m waiting, then
sitting – quietly.
Is she there?
Words shared.
Thoughts shared.
Hers mine.
My love hers.
Until we are mirrored.
Her love mine.
Mine hers.
Shared thoughts.
Shared words.
There she is.
Quietly sitting,
then waiting, I’m shown love.
Looking but not seeing.
Looking but not seeing.
Then waiting, I’m shown love –
quietly sitting.
There she is.
Shared words.
Shared thoughts.
Mine hers.
Her love mine.
Until we are mirrored.
My love hers.
Hers mine.
Thoughts shared.
Words shared.
Is she there?
Sitting quietly.
Love shown I’m waiting, then
seeing not. But looking.
I watch.
This mini-project may be over, but if it takes your fancy, we are always open to hearing more. You can always email your thoughts, writings, and whims to max@whiteweavearts.co.uk.