Day: April 14, 2021

For Our Freedom

~ JezzieG ~ 3 Comments

Form: Raven’s Rovi Sonnet 107

In the fields the scent of their blood remains
Combined with the stench of decaying flesh
Penetrating beauty with historic stains
And blades of grass whisper ‘the graves are full’
Overflowing with wasted bullets and bones
So many needless deaths, they gave it all
To gold braided men outside the war zones
The tears of weeping that was never seen
In a world refusing to start afresh
Disrespect from the callous hearts of stone
No care for the sacrifice on the plains
As they chatter on through the silent call
My words alone will not wipe the slate clean
For all those lives and all that might have been

©JGFarmer2021

Wiegenlied by Johannes Brahms

~ JezzieG

Wiegenlied
1868
Romantic

Johannes Brahms
Romantic
Born: 7 May 1833, Hamburg, Germany
Nationality: German
Died: 3 April 1897, Vienna, Austria

Brahms was a composer, pianist and conductor. He spent much of his professional life in Vienna. Brahms composed for orchestras, chamber ensembles, organ, piano and voice. A virtuoso pianist he premiered many of his own works himself. He is grouped with Bach and Beethoven as one of the ‘Three B’s’ of music

The Cold Song by Henry Purcell

~ JezzieG

The Cold Song
1691
Opera

Henry Purcell
Baroque
Born: 10 September 1659, London, UK
Nationality: English
Died: 21 November 1695, London, UK

Purcell was a composer of a uniquely English form of Baroque music which incorporated Italian and French elements. He is one of the greatest English composers and the most famous before the 20th century’s Elgar, Williams, and Britten.

Rondine Notes

~ JezzieG ~ 1 Comment

The Rondine is another much neglected French form. A repeating form, it is quite challenging to the poet, consisting of two stanzas, a septet (7 lines) and a quintet (5 lines). The refrain in which the last line both stanzas mimics the first phrase of the first line (R). There is no specified meter.

The rhyme scheme is as follows:
RabbaabR abbaR

Example

Rondine of the Rare Device (if you can kiss the mistress never kiss the maid) by Wesli Court

The maid will do if you’re not ambitious-
Why split the stalk if twigs will make the besom?
Why kill the roots if one may steal the blossom?
The garden is a plot of sundry pleasures
Filled with winding paths and rare devices,
Here a fountain, there a Grecian column-
The maid will do

Rose O’Morning winds upon the trellis
All hips and nettle snags and lures at random.
Is desire the better part of wisdom?
Brown-eyed Susan smiles from her bed of grasses-
The maid will do