Life and Death (A Paradelle)
by
Nancy Pawley
copyright 01-23-2008
Age Rating: 13 to 127
Picture Credits: www
The winter sun is pale and cold, no light or heat she gives
The winter sun is pale and cold, no light or heat she gives
I tighten up my threadbare coat, my helpless tears fall on her grave
I tighten up my threadbare coat, my helpless tears fall on her grave
Her threadbare grave is cold, she gives no tears or heat
My winter coat I tighten up and fall helpless on the pale sun light
The springtime brings no joyous tone, just sorrow in the setting sun
The springtime brings no joyous tone, just sorrow in the setting sun
Though flowers bloom and lovebirds sing, the summertime is dark array
Though flowers bloom and lovebirds sing, the summertime is dark array
The springtime lovebirds in the joyous sun just sing 'Sorrow is Setting'
And dark tone brings no array, though the summertime flowers bloom
Fine autumn tree shines gold and green, shimmering in the morning breeze
Fine autumn tree shines gold and green, shimmering in the morning breeze
I hold the tiny offered hand, and feel sweet smiles within my heart
I hold the tiny offered hand, and feel sweet smiles within my heart
Within the tiny hand I hold sweet offered smiles and feel my morning gold shines
in the heart shimmering tree and fine green autumn breeze
Though I pale within the threadbare breeze and fall helpless in the autumn grave
I tighten up the winter bloom and feel the offered hand
hold the tiny green tone tree and the cold array
Her morning coat is dark and fine, she brings sweet springtime flowers
Lovebirds sing in summertime heat, no tears or 'Sorrow is Setting'
Just joyous gold shines on my heart and gives my sun smiles shimmering light
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Looking forward to reading "more" of your work. Mike and Walter obviously enjoyed this style (form) of poetry from reading their comments. I can't wait to learn more.
Pleased to meet you!
Susan
Thanks for bringing this form to my attention. For me the saying "form follows function" applies just as much to poetry as it does to architecture, and it is instructive to consider an example by one of its greatest practitioners, Mies van der Rohe. In 1951 Mies completed the breathtakingly beautiful Farnsworth House in Plano, Illinois. The steel and glass house is beautiful precisely for what it doesn't have -- any relevance to traditional domestic function. In building it, Mies completely abandoned the notion of function in order to perfect a form, even going so far as to ensure it would be unlivable by refusing to provide common sense elements (like warming of the 9 foot high glass panels to prevent condensation) because they detracted from the purity of his vision.
The same thing happens when writers adhere too strictly to forms at the expense of content. How much poetry is unreadable because of an insistence on form over function? Of course, content without form can be equally unreadable (no form actually is a form, isn't it?). The writer's job should include finding the most appropriate form in which to deliver what s/he has to say.
Some information for others
Paradelle
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A paradelle is a modern poetic form which was invented by United States Poet Laureate Billy Collins as a parody of the villanelle.
[edit] Derivation
Billy Collins claimed that the paradelle was invented in eleventh century France, but he actually invented it himself to parody strict forms, particularly the villanelle. His sample paradelle, "Paradelle for Susan" (c1997), was intentionally terrible, completing the final stanza with the line "Darken the mountain, time and find was my into it was with to to".
[edit] Form
When Collins first published the paradelle, it was with the footnote "The paradelle is one of the more demanding French fixed forms, first appearing in the langue d'oc love poetry of the eleventh century. It is a poem of four six-line stanzas in which the first and second lines, as well as the third and fourth lines of the first three stanzas, must be identical. The fifth and sixth lines, which traditionally resolve these stanzas, must use all the words from the preceding lines and only those words. Similarly, the final stanza must use every word from all the preceding stanzas and only these words."
As an example, the original poem, "Paradelle for Susan", is as follows:
I remember the quick, nervous bird of your love.
I remember the quick, nervous bird of your love.
Always perched on the thinnest, highest branch.
Always perched on the thinnest, highest branch.
Thinnest love, remember the quick branch.
Always nervous, I perched on your highest bird the.
It is time for me to cross the mountain.
It is time for me to cross the mountain.
And find another shore to darken with my pain.
And find another shore to darken with my pain.
Another pain for me to darken the mountain.
And find the time, cross my shore, to with it is to.
The weather warm, the handwriting familiar.
The weather warm, the handwriting familiar.
Your letter flies from my hand into the waters below.
Your letter flies from my hand into the waters below.
The familiar waters below my warm hand.
Into handwriting your weather flies you letter the from the.
I always cross the highest letter, the thinnest bird.
Below the waters of my warm familiar pain,
Another hand to remember your handwriting.
The weather perched for me on the shore.
Quick, your nervous branch flew from love.
Darken the mountain, time and find was my into it was with to to.
[edit] The Paradelle Now
Not all reviewers of Collins' book recognized that the paradelle was a parody of formal poetry and of amateur poets who adhered to formalism at the expense of sense. Some reviews criticized "Paradelle for Susan" as an amateurish attempt at a difficult form without ever understanding that this was, indeed, the point.
Some poets also missed the parody and took the form seriously, writing their own paradelles. Others, knowing of the hoax, nevertheless decided to see what they could do with a form as strict as the paradelle's. Thus, although invented as a hoax, the paradelle has taken on a life of its own. In 2005, Red Hen Press published an anthology of paradelles.
Gifted, you capture both the spirit and the form, a great feel, I am at once back to a time when reading was almost as great as writing, very special.. Walt
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