Non-Rhyming Forms: Sestina

Sestina

Sestinas date back to the twelfth century and were a form of lyrical verse used by French troubadours. The form has six sestets (six line stanzas) followed by a tercet (three line stanza) that acts as an envoy. Instead of a rhyme scheme, the ending words from the first stanza are repeated as the ending words of the other five stanzas in a specific pattern. The last stanza (the envoy) then uses two of the ending words within each concluding line in a specific order.

The end-word scheme is as follows:

First stanza:
Word 1
Word 2
Word 3
Word 4
Word 5
Word 6

Second stanza
Word 6
Word 1
Word 5
Word 2
Word 4
Word 3

Third stanza
Word 3
Word 6
Word 4
Word 1
Word 2
Word 5

Fourth stanza
Word 5
Word 3
Word 2
Word 6
Word 1
Word 4

Fifth stanza
Word 4
Word 5
Word 1
Word 3
Word 6
Word 2

Sixth stanza
Word 2
Word 4
Word 6
Word 5
Word 3
Word 1

Concluding tercet (envoy):
middle of first line Word 2, end of first line Word 5
middle of second line Word 4, end of second line Word 3
middle if third line Word 6, end of third line Word 1


EXAMPLE:
Stubborn Words by JM Kenyon

My pregnant psyche labors over words
and somber fetuses embalmed in ink.
A restless scribble knots my burdened nerves
with these encrypted ciphers I can't grasp.
Interpretations drip from severed tongues,
absurd perceptions form a distant mood.

My prying, inquisition probes my mood
with midnight sockets strained on anxious words.
Judicial eyes echo in hollow tongues
as condemnation blots out ink with ink.
The choreography beyond my grasp,
and too much cursive panic braids my nerves.

A juxtapose of hope and doubt lace nerves
to uttered oaths that constipate my mood
and steal coherent visions from my grasp.
Yet still, I itemize all of my words
and weigh them each as if more valued ink
could form a lexis between paper tongues.

Cacophonies amassed on corded tongues
are stretched out over sapped and springless nerves
no longer seeking sense from contoured ink.
A conquered revelation stirs my mood
as scrawled ideas seem only wasted words
just loose impossibilities to grasp.

But, Ah! Defeat has never felt the grasp
of proud, defiant pens or styptic tongues
and I have never knelt before my words
or gave into a desperate play on nerves.
I forge from pathos-strands that strike a mood
translating patterns born of crisscrossed ink.

My muse cannot be humbled by the ink
nor pen that consecrates a poets grasp.
It cannot cringe beneath a vicious mood
or beg for mercy from those cryptic tongues.
My style depends upon elastic nerves
that stretch around the depth of single words.

Frustration spilled the ink and tied the tongues,
my mind froze in its grasp and strained my nerves
but no mood intercepts my stubborn words.