Saturday, August 18, 2012

Ciphered Poetry

Days,
A
I
B
Hold
C
Afar
D
Tonight
E
Strays,
A
Watched
F
Cold
C
From
G
Sight
E





Stealing
H
Life,
I
Embalming
J
Room—
K
Ever
L
Reeling—
H
Seemed
M
Calming—
J
Simple,
N
Clever,
L





Binding
O
Her
P
Remnants
Q
So
R
Weak
S
Finding
O
Lit
T
Commandments
Q
Upon
U
Doublespeak
S





Starred
V
Eyes
W
Guide
X
Her
Y
Cause
Z
Guarded
V
With
AA
Pride
X
Then
AB
Pause
Z





And
AC
She
AD
Said
AE
Each
AF
Sign
AG
Firsthand,
AC
As
AH
Unfed
AE
Loneliness
AI
Aligned
AG
CODED MESSAGE




B
I
AH
As

F
Watched
AD
She
P
Her
T
Lit
G
From
AF
Each
D
Afar
K
Room
I
Life
AA
With
M
Seemed
W
Eyes
R
So
U
Upon
N
Simple
Y
Her
AB
Then,
AI
Loneliness


Days, I hold afar tonight
strays, watched cold from sight

Stealing life, embalming room—ever
reeling—seemed calming—simple, clever,

Binding her remnants so weak,
finding lit commandments upon doublespeak,

Starred eyes guide her cause,
guarded with pride then pause,

And she said each sign
firsthand, as unfed loneliness aligned

Deciphered verse:

I watched her from afar
as she lit each room

Life seemed so simple then,
with eyes upon her loneliness


Ok, so I thought I did something a bit different a few weeks back, but lost my notes as to what the directions were, confused myself a bit, so held off on posting.  Found them today, so decided to post it.

The poem utilizes a mathematical, cipher type approach for building a poem.  In the large grid, you'll notice each box has a rhyme scheme listed, which indicates where rhymes occur and so forth.

Their are two poems created here, but, to be fair, you kind of have to keep the hidden poem in mind while creating the original one.  

The original poem will be entered into the spaces in the grid, making sure the rhyme schemes fit.  Then, the columns that do not rhyme are extracted, and thus, become a poem of their own.

Hopefully this explanation, and the poem itself, in grid and then broken down to how both original and hidden poem look taken out of the grid are adequate enough to understanding how this puzzle type of poem works.


7 comments:

  1. holy crap dude...how does your mind work...fascinating ...

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  2. Very intriguing, Fred. It requires certain awareness on the words and rhymes to extract/decipher the hidden poem.

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  3. Always good at math so I think I got the jest of it with ease, again an interesting way to approach a verse, always coming up with nifty ideas at your sea. The gradual beating down to the last act was great.

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  4. cool - I love these types of exercises. Have you ever tried a squared stanza? let me know if you do. I'm going to try this one today! thanks!

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  5. I think I did it, Fred. Let me know if you have a minute. thanks!

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    Replies
    1. I loved your use of the form, even a better example than my own. Really an amazing job. As for the squared stanza, yes I do believe I have done those before. I believe, D'verse had one for a form for all a little while back, those are both fun and challenging as well. Thanks again, really glad you enjoyed the form.

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