The Incendiary Lit Heroic Crown Affair Day 3
So by now you have a slightly more polished finale sonnet. Don’t start with the first sonnet. Obviously you’ll be re-writing all of these sonnets at one point or another, but at this moment you’re not entirely sure of where the crown’s going, admit it. If you do, and can manage to get through the entire sequence doing exactly what you set out to do, all the power to you. In fact, I’ll stand up on my chair and bow to you, if the sequence is even half decent. Amazing. I know that I almost never end up with what I set out to write, but usually the pieces fall together in an even more intriguing way, so I’ve just learned to go with it. Plan, and divert from the plan when my fingers and brain decide to (but not abandon the plan altogether).
Today there’s an exercise, but it is directly related to the sequence. Take each ‘first line’, or each line from Sonnet 15, and write two alternate next lines. Keep it either in iambic pent or at least with 10 syllables. And it has to rhyme. If you have any specific ideas for the individual poems try to experiment with two entirely different beginnings for the same idea, even if you think you know where you’re going, try a different way for this exercise. That’s 28 lines total. Whee!
While you’re going over each line trying to rhyme it, turn a keen eye on the adjectives, especially colors. Make any ordinary words extraordinary by changing them. Check the thesaurus and your brain and make every word count.