here's background on these fab 4:
limericks end with the same sounds: lines 1,2,5, are A and 3 and 4 are B - what we could do here is after posting yours, you provide the words to end the lines of the one - example clue/stew/harsh/marsh/chew
sonnets are obviously hard as hell but we could have fun and maybe even turn some good ones out. personally i'd have more fun eating nails.
maybe we could each contribute 2 lines at a time? or 7 and 7.
death poems are sort of self-explanatory aren't they? i wrote mine one sad silly night years ago, although they're supposed to be done at ceremonial moments, (like hari kari - DON"T try at home!!) before the big bye-bye. there was a full moon that provided sentimental background, too.
with this one we could use the format we've used for the haiku - the last person's last line and build on it. it could be simultaneously spiritual, silly, helpful (like a friend of mine lost her friend recently, and i had nothing to offer but a poem) .
so the tanka (a.k.a. waka) was really popular into the 1500's - and i always think of my brothers' tonka trucks when i hear this word.
"The first three lines (kami no ku) usually present an image or thought and the last two lines (shimo no ku) shift the focus to a related idea. We might see this as similar to a sonnet's "turn." - from http://web.njit.edu/~ronkowit/poetso...rch_tanka.html
with this one we could add the last two lines, and start the first three of the next.
here's an example by Lady Ise:
Pillows know, they say,
and so we slept without one.
Why then do rumors
like swirling pillars of dust
rise as high as the heavens?
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) Another idea for that is instead of starting the lines of the poem for the next person, maybe we could write one then provide the topic for the next. Like, "[my poem].......cat fur in the sun." Then you write about cat fur in the sun, and suggest another topic.
A Tanka about The Universe.
