Saturday, August 11, 2012

A Mini-Challenge for Sunday ~ Cyhydedd Hir

Unpronounceable?
Try this: cuh-hée-dedd heer. 


Pembroke Castle, Wales
Manfred Heyde
Yes, this weekend we are visiting Wales, where we will become familiar with one of their many ancient forms of poetic expression.

The basis of Cyhydedd Hir is a single line of 19 syllables, and two rhymes, set out as follows:

x x x x A x x x x A x x x x A x x x B (where x is a single syllable)

However many variations of this pattern are possible.

Couplet:

x x x x A x x x x A 
x x x x A x x x B

Tercet:

x x x x A
x x x x A
x x x x A x x x B

Quatrain:

x x x x A
x x x x A
x x x x A 
x x x B

Further explanation and example: HERE

The final poem should consist of the basic 19 syllable variation repeated four times with new rhymes introduced within each section.

A typical pattern is as follows:

xxxxb
xxxxb
xxxxb
xxxA
xxxxb
xxxxb
xxxxb
xxxA

xxxxc
xxxxc
xxxxc
xxxA  (or D)
xxxxd
xxxxd
xxxxd
xxxA  (or D)

The capital letters denote that the fourth lines contain the weighted or main rhyme.

 Further explanation and example: Here.

This is a form I experimented with a while ago and I have linked a few below as examples.  I had a lot of fun within the parameters, but I have not tried all the variations.

In Your Hands

Questions Fielded 

Sympathy


Prince Charles Quay, Wales
Poet: Ceri Wyn Jones
Photo: Stephen McKay
While looking through images of Welsh poetry, I noticed that many examples are to be found on walls, buildings and memorials.


Poet: Cynan
Photo: Alan Fryer

Quarryman's Memorial
Photo: Eric Jones
The Free Verse theme, therefore, is "Poetry written on Walls".


The Sunday Challenge is posted on Saturday at noon CST to allow extra time for the form challenge. Management reserves the right to remove unrelated links, but invites you to share a poem of your choice on Open Link Monday.

All images sourced at Wikimedia Commons.



14 comments:

hedgewitch said...

Looks very toothsome, Kerry. Thanks for including links to yours, which made it seem much more approachable. We will see if anything bubbles up to suit this interesting, very rhythmical form.

Susan said...

Kerry, is the [bracketed line] an invention of your own? It doesn't change the schematic, but seems to give the line a different status--like a summary of a title--than I have seen elsewhere. I like it.

Kerry O'Connor said...

Yes, the brackets were my invention. Definitely not a requisite of the original. I was trying out a few ideas, with them and the half-rhyme. Triple rhymes can be a bit too solid for my liking.

Kay L. Davies said...

Oh, yes, the Welsh do love a poet.
I will have to give this one a try, as a small salute to my Welsh ancestors.
K

august1aday said...

Call that a mini challenge :-)
Develish. I'm wide awake after that. Sorry effort compared to yours, but fun to try.

Marian said...

i'm feeling significantly better (knock on wood!) and am gonna give this a whirl today. xoxo

Susan said...

So Kerry, I have learned a form of laughter just for your mini-challenge which is about as far from mini as a NY Time Sunday Crossword is from one in a child's weekly reader. I loved so much the idea of writing something worthy to carve into a wall, but all my attempts came out so limerick-like, that I wonder how funny some of that writing on the wall truly is!! Hmm?

Marian said...

it is somewhat limerick-ish, isn't it? kind of a cross between haiku and limerick, odd for a welsh poem, or maybe not so odd. i think if i work with this form for a while i could really do it justice. loved yours, susan! you're the bomb. like all i've read so far, actually. mine's up too. and now that i can actually walk on my foot (i've been laid up since friday morning) we are off to enjoy the last day of vacation! happy sunday lovely toads! xoxo marian

hedgewitch said...

I'm having no luck so far, but as long as I'm trying I feel I can't peek at other people's efforts.

Hope you are all well again, Marian.

Margaret said...

Yikes. This was a DOOZIE and I probably should have thrown in the towel. At least I gave it a whirl. (not even sure if I did it correctly)...

Off to read the others efforts now.

Anonymous said...

Hi Kerry - I found this kind of hard until I just let go a bit - or maybe better - until I just learned to get rid of every failed stanza and try something different - also went quite simple in a way. Thanks for the challenge. k.

PS _ I realize I posted the link here wrong but will correct. k.

Lessandra said...

I especially liked your In Your Hands although Questions Fielded tugged at my heart.

Mary B. Mansfield said...

I went the free verse route with this...going to make sure I save the info on this form to try at a later date. Great prompt, Kerry!

hedgewitch said...

Very very late to the party, but I enjoyed gnashing my teeth...I mean the painstaking exercise of craft--shaping up a non-form poem into one of these. Thanks Kerry, as always, for your majorly-challenging mini-challenge. ;_)