Saturday, March 14, 2009

a Pantoum consists of a series of quatrains rhyming ABAB in which the second and fourth lines of a quatrain recur as the first and third lines in the succeeding quatrain; each quatrain introduces a new second rhyme as BCBC, CDCD. The first line of the series recurs as the last line of the closing quatrain, and third line of the poem recurs as the second line of the closing quatrain, rhyming ZAZA.

I think this form of poetry is a little confusing, and very unpopular due to the rigorous structure and little space for a messae to come accross. In A Survey of Engligh Poetry I found a poem that hopefully has somewhat of a pantoum structure or jsut varies slightly form it. I looked for hte repetition in lines, which I saw.

As Dew in Aprille by Anonymous
I sing of a maiden
That is makels:
King of all kings
To her son she ches.

He came also stille
There his moder was,
As dew in Aprille
That falleth on the grass.

He came al so stille
To his moder's bour,
As dew in Aprille
That falleth on the flour.

He came al so stille
There his moder lay,
As dew in Aprille
That falleth on the spray.

Moder and mayden
Was never none but she:
Well may such a lady
Goddess moder be.

All I could find on youtube were really high pitched annoying choires singing this song along wiht harps, so I thought I'd spare you guys and just write about it. Anyway, I guess that this was a medival hymn of some sort which was found and written down as poetry, or the opposite way around. "As Dew in Aprille" disgusses the relationship between a mother and son, and then progresses toward a mother and a madden. The repetition of "As dew in Aprille" is signifigant to the fact that it is in the middle three stanzas, and sets the light tone for hte poem. The "King" is presumeably the maiden's husband who is being idolized and the "fallen" aspects of the poem sudgest a lapse in something, although I am not quite sure what. I do't really understand all the symbolism of hte poem, but htat is my best analysis.

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