Given Larvatus Prodeo’s fondness for haiku and limericks and, recently, double dactyls, I thought it would be a shame if we didn’t mention the latest craze that is apparently sweeping the blogosphere: the fib.
With a syllable pattern based on the Fibonnaci sequence, the fib has been arbitrarily capped at six lines (1/1/2/3/5/8), partly so that it is short enough to fairly compare with the haiku, and partly because it explodes after the first few lines:
The thing about the Fib, though, is that after the ninth line, you’re dealing with 50-plus syllables, which means you’re essentially writing prose paragraphs. By the 21st line, you’re dealing with a hefty 10,946 syllables — which translates to about 6,700 words of English prose. That’s an entire short story on its own, or a chapter from a book.
With that in mind, the six-line limit seems reasonable to me (only Jack Strocchi could get much further…).
Anyway, here’s a quick one to get you in the mood:
Is
she?
Missy…
Well, is she?
You know what I mean…
Is she one of those… lipsnigers?
Now, have at it.
A
nice
cold beer
is tempting.
It’s morning tea time.
Why not start the day’s drinking early?
There’s
One
Extra
Syllable
In your last line there,
Though I can’t fault your sentiment.
I’d
like
to join
the ‘real Left’.
I thought I was in,
but I must have been mistaken.
I
watch
with glee
while the Left
fight among themselves
was a Rightie behind Euston?
Watch
out,
Jason.
That kind of
rank schadenfreude
Shows your provocateurism!
Left,
Right,
Left, Right,
Left. I fear
he’s right and Euston
the work of sinster dexters!
Eat
cake
Liam;
Leftiness
follows, like fearless
McConvill after Great Leader.
‘Sinister dexters’: nice work Zoe. [claps]
…
Flute
gone?
Let us
pause a bit
and encourage him
to undo his resignation.
The
Flute
Himself
Has often
mock’d resting bloggers:
“You’ll be back, sunshine. Wait and see.”
What
is
this news
a-bout Flute?
What has he done?
Why, then, has he gone?
I
don’t
recall
really don’t recall
bribing Saddam, screwing Iraq
–Alex D
‘Lex
stays
Flute goes
Conundrum!
Unprecedented?
Or can I simply not recall…
1.
This
form’s
easy.
*Too* easy.
It’s no form at all.
“Freedom is slavery.” You know?
2.
Where’s
the
use of
cool rhythm,
and ingenious rhymes?
What’s in this thing to make me laugh?
3.
Can
you
even
imagine
Dante’s “Inferno”
written in these cretinous fibs?
4.
This
one
took me
no longer
to think than to write.
Pull the other one; it’s got bells.
The
train
leaves the
blog station
but without the old
Leninists of yore waving bye.
I
Am
Sorry
For the way
I have been away for
So long, it was my mental health
Tom-
Kat’s
baby
born today!
Did Katie scream? Is
Suri human or alien?
Oh
My
Goddess
Let us hope
That poor dear Katie
And Suri escape evil Tom
Said
One
Fish to
The other
‘Can we be sole mates?’
{Homer, Homer, where art thou?}
Eat
fish,
penguins
like to yes.
Penguins aren’t yoda.
But fibs make us sound like we are.
Hi
there,
Zoe.
Nice ‘dexter/
sinister’ joke. ‘Gauche/
adroit’ would also fit the bill.
when I drink Moet I am a poet but I didn’t knowet
How
can
I get
my picture
to appear in here?
Penguins are handsome birds indeed.
…and by that I mean, how can I get rid of the big question mark in the box next to my posts and replace it with a nice pingu-themed picture?
Visit the gravatar site and register an 80X80 pixel picture. It should appear in a day or two.
BBEP: ‘ I am a poet but I didn’t knowet’
Shame
Shame
On you
Homer, you
Ripped off line from Bob’s
‘I shall be free no. 10′
http://www.bobdylan.com/songs/befree10.html
go
to
this site
register
picture of penguin
(sorry, must stick to the right form)
Since it’s called a ‘fib,’ maybe it would be more formally challenging if the last line had to be a lie?
meantime, back to clerihews…
Fibonnaci
Liked his Scotch-y
But didn’t care threepence
For another man’s sequence
…you know, if the ‘fib’ or untruthful last line had to challenge or contradict what went before; like the couplet at the end of some kinds of sonnets, or La Dorothy Parker’s famous formulation “And I am Marie of Rumania.”
North
south
east and
westerly
“sinister dexter”
is fine wit at its besterly
albeit from a human husk idealogue
See, jpz, if you rhyme line 4 with line 6, then a final line of 12 syllables contains your ‘fib’, a lyrical form emerges. A crap one, but hey! This IS poetry, after all.
Zoe, no fences tended. Just following my train of thought from the other thread.
We’ll
soon
for-get
Di-ox-in
le-vels in fish,
so go-vern-ment feels. …….