Friday, March 4, 2016

Sedoka: Two Halves Make a Whole

Whirling head poem.  

That's how one site translates the ancient Japanese poetry form, the Sedoka  (旋頭歌)  

Don't you love that?

The idea of Sedoka is that two poems (each of the syllable count 5-7-7) are put together, and the whole is a more complete picture than either half.




Bowl of cherries, ripe.
Best to eat them, one by one
By oneself, with attention.


Bowl of cherries, ripe.
Best to pie them, all in all
Before you get too mind full.

----Sara Lewis Holmes (all rights reserved)


The Sedoka can also be used as a form of dialogue, with one poem talking to the other. That includes head-whirling joke-telling, right? (Please forgive me.)


Waiter, there’s a fly.
There! in my soup, back-stroking!
Put him back in the punch line.

Doctor! There’s a joke
There! In my coffee, sinking!
Milk it, my dear one. Milk it.

Mortician! There’s no
brevity in my wit; could
rigor mortis have set in?

Scribe, a eulogy!
There! in my plump thesaurus!
It’s dying a thousand deaths.

---Sara Lewis Holmes (all rights reserved)




My Poetry Sisters all played with Sedoka today, too. Go see what wonderful wholes they made:

Liz
Laura
Tricia
Andi
Tanita
Kelly


Poetry Friday is hosted today by Linda at TeacherDance.