12/7/12

My son's first sestina, for Poetry Friday

My blogging time was severely constrained this week by the amount of homework my son had (and many other things as well)...sigh. So since I have nothing else to offer, here is one of the products of this past week of business--his first sestina.

Balloon show
By B. H.

Balloons navigate by hot air.
Our balloon hangar is infested with monkeys!
The biggest balloons are called zeppelins.
But if it rains,
water soaks the balloon cloth,
and we have to stop the show.

We try not to stop the show,
but some of our pilots have heads of air.
Luckily our balloons are reinforced with cloth,
and we stitched on pictures of good-luck monkeys.
Oh good, it will not rain.
There go the racing zeppelins!

Oh no! a crashing zeppelin!
This will surely ruin the show.
Please please please don’t rain.
Smoke is billowing in the air!
That pilot that crashed is such a monkey.
Know what’s burning? Balloon cloth!

We got  the shipment of balloon cloth
today. Now we can repair the zeppelin!
What are those monkeys
doing in the balloon that starts the show?
Help! That balloon is filling with hot air!
Catch it before it rains!

We caught the rogue balloon before it rained,
So there was no damage to its cloth.
Though clouds are billowing in the air,
Now we can repair the zeppelin!
Now we can perform our show!
Now, where are those mischievous monkeys?

The zoo people came and took away the monkeys
and it will not rain
today. This is going to be a great show!
Good thing we got that new cloth.
We spent weeks on that zeppelin.
Now let us float on a sea of air.

No more monkeys so we aren’t buying more cloth.
The rain is really bad for the zeppelins.
We had a great show in the air.

The Poetry Friday round-up is at Robyn Hood Black's blog today!

9 comments:

  1. Wow, that is fantastic - I love the pilots with their heads of air and then the shift from meataphorical to real monlkeys - or is it?!? I empathise with you oveer how children's homwork can get in the way of our own creativity - but you have something good to show for it here!

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  2. Sestinas are SO. MUCH. WORK.
    I bow before the Benmeister. Not too low, though. Mustn't swell that head. ☺

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  3. Zeppelins and monkeys! How great is that?

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  4. Sooooooo creative! Thanks for sharing. A tip of the hat to the young poet.

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  5. B.H., you have inspired me to try a sestina!

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  6. Great sestina! A tip of my hat to you.

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  7. Sestinas are so difficult! Love the boldness of monkeys and zeppelins!

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  8. An excellent sestina - they are not easy to compose and your son has done a great job with his. Shame homework gets in the way of your creativity - but it will pass...believe me...and you'll be so proud you encouraged him to get his homework completed. Life goes past so very quickly.

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