(no subject)

[jarandhel]

 The world is a wizard's game.

It stinks of starlight and steel.

We know the rules, all the same,

And we walk this lonely wheel.

 

It stinks of starlight and steel,

Memory and hope and dream.

As we walk our lonely wheel,

Things are never as they seem.

 

Memory and hope and dream,

Aching, haunting, being born.

Things are never all they seem,

Two made one, the world is torn.

 

Aching, haunting, being born,

Which is pleasure, which is pain?

Two made one, their world is torn,

Is it madness to be sane?

 

Which is pleasure, which is pain?

What new gods make their ingress?

It is madness to be sane.

Hail the gods of the new flesh!

 

What new gods make their ingress?

Dreams of a forbidden sort.

We're the gods of the new flesh;

Hail the Red Queen and her court!

 

Dreams of a forbidden sort,

We know the rules, all the same.

Tell the Red Queen and her court:

The world is a wizard's game.

Comments

[arethinn]

What's the name of this poetic form?

[jarandhel]

Pantoum. It's originally a Malay form, but it's really become one of my personal favorites. http://www.shadowpoetry.com/resources/wip/pantoum.html

I did modify it slightly, though - in this poem, there's the added rule that the third line of every stanza after the first is slightly modified from the fourth line of the one before it, rather than repeating exactly. I also kept each line exactly 7 syllables.

[arethinn]

I also kept each line exactly 7 syllables.

Hmmm, o rly? ;)

[jarandhel]

Yep. 7 syllables, 7 stanzas. 7 might just be a Thing. ;-)