Sign up and log into this forum using your McMaster email/ID. Then, post a one stanza follow-up to the preceding post, adding to the collaborative poem (learn more about how this works here) that we're developing together. You can contribute multiple times, but just not with one post after another.
The poem ends either when we reach the end of the Sestina (after 7 posts, as this structure consists of 7 stanzas), or the deadline of February 21 has passed—whichever comes first.
What are you waiting for? Adding to the chain should only take a few minutes, and the draw of the prize aside, you'll also be making your mark in a cool, collaborative project that'll act as a time capsule for how the McMaster community connected through our creativity during these COVID times.
The first writer can start with one stanza, with the following picture as a guiding prompt and with the reminder that the poem's title will be 'Unprecedented.' This poem will be in Sestina Form, which can be tricky but also fun to work with because of its extra rules.
As you're writing, be sure to note what the person above you has done and where they're at in terms of completing the Sestina pattern!
I hear you
Though I cannot acknowledge thee,
As I am incapable of seeing you
And I fear I that may not be able to reach you,
Among bones and flesh
My yearning to connect
Is silenced by every memory I'll soon forget
To connect, to my understanding,
Is something today we would surely regret.
I can do nothing but wish for some whisper
Some ringing of sound to fill my silence
For now I will wait until I can safely connect
With the heart of a friend, I will no longer waste breath
On words that are heard by my ears alone
My quiet nights will not sound with the pang of a drum.
I hear you, I see you
but do you acknowledge the?
But the moon dispels sooner than the silence,
Replaced by an orange glow that draws my breath
Like music that steals the soul with each beat of the drum.
Yet my dark shadow lengthens alone.
I am the inky night to the ivory day- inconceivable to connect
Even though all it would take is a whisper.
There is nothing to hear but the release of a small breath
As I sit out in the garden, cold and alone
My one wish flies up to the moon in a whisper
In the simple way that stars shine, oh, I wish to connect
With a soul in far orbit, we could beat a soft drum
And our rhythm could echo and replace this lengthening silence.
What is worse than being alone?
Every inch of me screams to just - connect
Something to fill this poisonous silence
That pounds throughout my soul, a drum
Constant, unrelenting, the pang of solitude. And I whisper
To myself - my only companion is my own breath.
How unrelenting is the desire to connect,
Pounding against my chest like the echo of a drum.
Shakily, I draw in a shallow breath,
Words falling like raindrops from my lips in a soft whisper.
My timid plea is met with a deafening silence.
Perhaps I am to always be alone.