[Bards] Poetic Exercise #3

[Dawn Rummel]

She cast her gaze upon me once tonight

A gaze as sweet as roses, and as fine.

A thorny bush has twined about my heart
For I am hers, but n'er will she be mine.

Antonia/Dawn (playing catch-up)


Ulf Gunnarsson <ulfie at cox.net> wrote:
Iambic pentameter is best known to us from the plays of William
Shakespeare. It is a line of five sets of unstressed/stressed syllables,
such as "The course of true love never did run smooth" from "A Midsummer
Night's Dream". (Hint: da-dum da-dum da-dum da-dum da-dum.)

C.S. Lewis described courtly love as the "Religion of Love". In the
middle ages, a common topic of poetry was the unattainable love. The
object of the poem was often of a higher station or calling, though in
some cases they were unattainable because they were dead or, more often,
already married. This did not deter the poet from pouring his heart's
blood out through his pen.

For bardic exercise #3, write four lines of iambic pentameter. The
subject should be an "unattainable", such as your Queen, a knight, or a
church figure. It should be expressed in terms of courtly love. Talk
of their beauty, their grace, their wondrous physical attributes...
whatever. It doesn't have to outright declare your undying love, but it
should at least hint at the potential inclination. Your current
significant other is not allowed.

Remember that this is for fun, and that we play at the Middle Ages
here. Don't take any of the answers posted here as serious love
letters.

Ulf Gunnarsson

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Antonia/Dawn

It's the little things in life...

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