BOOK OF NEW

POETRY FORMS

Revised

WENDY WEBB
BOOK OF NEW
POETRY FORMS

WENDY WEBB
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 Copyright 2013, 2023 (revised), Wendy Webb

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Contents

DAVIDIAN, NEW VERSE FORM 2002 ...................................7

DEVISED BY WENDY WEBB ..................................................7
ALL YOU NEED IS… EDEN (DAVIDIAN) ........................... 9
‘DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT’
(DAVIDIAN) .....................................................................10
ROYAL LEAVEN FOR THE LOAF (DAVIDIAN) ................10
FOR THE WOMEN OF RUSSIA (DAVIDIAN) .................... 11
SEVEN STAGES OF THE MOON (DAVIDIAN) .................. 12
TO BE OR NOT TO BE (DAVIDIAN) .................................. 13
CANDLES ON THE WIND FOR BESLAN (DAVIDIAN) ...... 14
TOMORROW I LOVE YOU (DAVIDIAN) ........................... 16
FRIENDLY HEAVEN FROM SEASONS PAST (DAVIDIAN)
...................................................................................... 16
DUST AND FLOWERS (DAVIDIAN) ................................. 18
GLORIA IN EXCELSIS SOARS TO HEAVEN (DAVIDIAN) 19
HOLY TOKENS OF LOVE (DAVIDIAN) ........................... 20
IT’S DECEMBER (DAVIDIAN) ......................................... 21
LIFE IS LIKE A BUTTERFLY (DAVIDIAN) ...................... 22
TINA TURNER’S HOT IN MY GARDEN (DAVIDIAN) ...... 22
LANDSCAPE OF BREAD (DAVIDIAN) ............................ 23
DAISY CHAINS IN JANUARY (DAVIDIAN)..................... 24
DARKNESS OF BYRON (DAVIDIAN) .............................. 25
THE PERFUME SPILT (DAVIDIAN) ................................ 25
FROM THE CRADLE TO THE GRAVE (DAVIDIAN) ......... 26
HUMANITY’S TIDE (DAVIDIAN) ..................................... 27
SHROUDED LOVE (DAVIDIAN) ..................................... 28
THREE TIERS FOR BOTTICELLI’S EDEN (DAVIDIAN) .. 29
WHEN BEAUTIFUL IS THE ONLY WORD (DAVIDIAN) .. 30
WHERE FEAR RESTS (DAVIDIAN) ................................. 31
CRYSTAL LAKE (DAVIDIAN) ......................................... 32
MINIMAL DAVIDIANS (ONE VERSE ONLY) ...................... 33
EVERY BREATH YOU TAKE ......................................... 33
FULL OF EASTERN PROMISE ...................................... 33
PATTING A PASTORAL SHIFT ..................................... 33
WINTER’S SCRIBE ....................................................... 34
COUNTENANCING ROYALTY ...................................... 34
SIMPLY FAILING TO EXIST ......................................... 34
THE CRYSTAL CRACKED (DAVIDIAN) .......................... 35
IN THE HANDS OF GOD (DAVIDIAN)............................. 36
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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

CHRISTMASES SO LONG AGO (DAVIDIAN).................... 37

END OF DAVIDIAN SECTION ....................................... 38
MAGI, NEW VERSE FORM 2003 BY WENDY WEBB ‘WISE MEN’
POEMS ........................................................................... 39
SERPENT’S KISS (MAGI) ............................................... 40
HARMLESS AS ART (MAGI) .......................................... 40
BREATH’S GAZING POOL (MAGI) .................................. 41
ASTROLOGER OF FATE (MAGI) .................................... 41
BIRD TABLE SCRAPS (MAGI) ....................................... 42
ECLIPSING A NEW EARTH (MAGI) .............................. 42
FORGETFUL AS THE STARS (MAGI) ............................ 43
HELIGAN’S GIANT MERMAID (MAGI) ......................... 43
HOPE’S ETERNAL SPRING (MAGI) .............................. 44
MAGI OF THE SEA (MAGI)............................................ 44
STARGAZING MAGI (MAGI) ......................................... 45
TENDER NARCISSUS’ SCENT (MAGI) .......................... 45
WE SEE THREE SHIPS (MAGI) ..................................... 46
WINTER GARDEN (MAGI) ............................................ 46
DROWNING AUGUST SUN (MAGI)................................47
DUOMO SANTA MARIA DEL FIORE, CATHEDRAL,
FLORENCE (MAGI) ...........................................................47
MAGI OF PEACE (MAGI) ............................................... 48
MAGI OF ABSENCE (MAGI) .......................................... 48
MAGI OF LOVE (MAGI) ................................................. 49
ABBEY GROUNDS, WALSINGHAM (MAGI) ................. 49
END OF MAGI SECTION ............................................... 49
ECHOTAIN, NEW VERSE FORM 2004 BY WENDY WEBB ..... 50
ECHOTAIN (I LOVE MYSELF) ............................................ 51
ECHOTAIN (RELIGIOUS PEOPLE)..................................... 52
ECHOTAIN (A STRAY) .................................................... 53
ECHOTAIN (RUTH) ....................................................... 54
ECHOTAIN (SHEEP) .......................................................55
ECHOTAIN (SUN RISES) .............................................. 56
ECHOTAIN (THE FLUTIST, SAN GIMIGNANO) ............ 57
ECHOTAIN (STRANGERS’ HALL) ..................................... 58
ECHOTAIN (THE WORLD REVOLVES) ............................... 58
ECHOTAIN (AT HORSEY MERE) ...................................... 59
END OF ECHOTAIN POEMS ......................................... 59
SESTEENSY, POETRY VARIATION OF THE SESTINA, 2004 BY
WENDY WEBB................................................................. 60
ARC OF PROMISE (SESTEENSY) .................................... 60

3
END OF SESTEENSY ..................................................... 61
ANDROPIAN NEW VERSE FORM 2005 WENDY WEBB ........ 62
SEE PROMENADES (VERSION 1) (ANDROPIAN) ............... 64
SEE PROMENADES (VERSION 2) (ANDROPIAN)............... 64
SEE PROMENADES (VERSION 3) (ANDROPIAN)............... 65
GIVE LIFE BY GIFTING OURSELVES (ANDROPIAN) ...... 65
FLAG BLUE, AGED-WHITE SAINT (ANDROPIAN) .......... 66
SALT SEASONED (ANDROPIAN) .....................................67
SEASONS FOCUSED (ANDROPIAN).................................67
SUN RISES, DAWN LIGHT SHINES (ANDROPIAN) ........ 68
JOURNEY SPHINX-LIKE (ANDROPIAN) ........................ 68
EASTER PILGRIM: CRADLED HOPE RELEASED
(ANDROPIAN) ................................................................. 69
SIMPLE BRIEF: KNOW ONE TOO (ANDROPIAN) ........... 69
VOTE SAINTLINESS (ANDROPIAN) ............................... 70
WAR ON WANT (ANDROPIAN) ....................................... 70
PEPPER CELLAR (ANDROPIAN)...................................... 71
PERFUMED WORDS (ANDROPIAN) ................................ 71
END OF ANDROPIAN POEMS ....................................... 71
FRESCO, NEW VERSE FORM 2006 BY WENDY WEBB ........... 72
DAVID AND SIGNORIA (FRESCO)................................... 73
SILENT CANARIES (FRESCO) ......................................... 73
VARIATION OF DAVID AND SIGNORIA ........................74
TRIPTYCH, NEW VERSE FORM 2006 WENDY WEBB ........... 75
SLUMBERING SIENA CHERUBS (TRIPTYCH) .................76
MOMENT IN THE STARS (TRIPTYCH, ALTERNATIVE) .......76
SORROW’S NESTLING (TRIPTYCH) ................................ 77
WEAVING SOUND: LEFT, RIGHT; CENTRAL GONG!
(TRIPTYCH) ..................................................................... 77
CRADLED WORDS (TRIPTYCH) ..................................... 78
APRIL SHOWERS (TRIPTYCH) ....................................... 78
BEAMING (TRIPTYCH) ................................................... 78
END OF TRIPTYCH POEMS ...........................................79
INCUBUS / SUCCUBUS POEM, NEW VERSE FORM 2007 BY
WENDY WEBB................................................................. 80
A WARNING (INCUBUS/SUCCUBUS POEM) ........................ 81
QUEST FOR TRUTH (INCUBUS/SUCCUBUS) ..................... 82
PALINDROMEDARY SONNET, NEW VERSE FORM 2007 BY
WENDY WEBB................................................................. 83
BRIGHT EYES (FIRST PALINDROMEDARY SONNET) ........... 85
BRIDGE OF SIGHS (PALINDROMEDARY SONNET) ............. 86

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

REFLECTING BEACH (PALINDROMEDARY SONNET) ........ 87

LAST TIPPLE (PALINDROMEDARY, FREESTYLE SONNET) .... 88
RUBY CROWN (PALINDROMEDARY, FREESTYLE) .............. 89
PERSEPHONE’S MONUMENT (PALINDROMEDARY SONNET)
..................................................................................... 90
END OF PALINDROMEDARY SONNETS ...................... 90
PETROS ACROSTIC, NEW VERSE FORM 2007 BY WENDY
WEBB ............................................................................. 91
PETROS ACROSTIC – HAPPY NEW YEAR ........................ 92
PETROS ACROSTIC – PARIS .......................................... 92
PETROS ACROSTIC – LONDON ...................................... 92
EASTER SONNET (ACROSTIC)........................................ 93
DEPRESSED (ACROSTIC) ............................................... 93
END OF ACROSTIC POEMS .......................................... 93
STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS POETRY 2008, AS USED BY
WENDY WEBB................................................................. 94
READ WENDY’S ‘STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS’ POETRY:- ... 95
SLIDING DOORS, NEW POETRY FORM 2009 BY WENDY
WEBB ............................................................................ 96
OASIS NEAR (SLIDING DOORS STYLE) ............................. 98
PLAYING CAT AND MOUSE (SLIDING DOORS STYLE
PANTOUM) ...................................................................... 99
SHAGGED OUT (SLIDING DOORS STYLE PANTOUM)......... 100
RESTING IN PEARLS (SLIDING DOORS STYLE PANTOUM). 101
END OF SLIDING DOORS POEMS ............................... 101
BRENTOR SONNET, NEW POETRY FORM 2009 BY WENDY
WEBB ........................................................................... 102
THE BRENTOR SONNET ............................................. 102
SPANISH STEPS (BRENTOR SONNET) ............................. 103
END OF BRENTOR SONNETS ...................................... 103
SYNAESTHESIA, APPROACH TO POETRY 2010 BY............104
STAR DAVIDIAN – NEW VARIATION OF FORM (2012) WENDY
WEBB ...........................................................................106
THAT FIRST CHRISTMAS STAR (STAR DAVIDIAN 2012 –
1ST RECORDED POEM) ....................................................... 107
STAR SHINE (2013) – NEW VERSE FORM DEVISED BY WENDY
WEBB .......................................................................... 108
GENESIS OF STAR SHINE ...........................................109
VARIATION (EDITORS WILL HATE THIS ONE, BUT NICE ON A
CARD!): ......................................................................... 110
ANOTHER VARIATION: ............................................... 111

5
HAVE YOU SEEN WENDY’S OTHER BOOKS?

20 TIPS TO KEEP EDITORS HAPPY

A MERMAID’S TALE (PHANTASMAGORICAL TALE IN VERSE)
BEST LAID PLANS (short stories)
NATURE AND FLOWERS (THEMED POETRY)
ANGELS’ WINGS AND STARS (themed poetry)

AVAILABLE HERE AT OBOOKO

6
WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

DAVIDIAN, New verse form 2002

devised by Wendy Webb

This new poetry form has been developed from the Jewish-
Christian tradition. In the Bible the number FORTY has great
significance, meaning a very long time; also, the number
SEVEN, meaning perfection. The Bible also speaks of a Year of
Jubilee, fifty years. The Davidian Poem is launched in the
Golden Jubilee year of Queen Elizabeth II. It is named after
the first anointed Jewish King David; in the New Testament,
Jesus is described as the 'son of David'. The new poetry form,
the DAVIDIAN POEM, devised by , is based on the numbers
40 (long time) and 7 (perfection).

English literature has roots in Biblical tradition, Greek and

Roman philosophy (Milton, Blake, Herbert, Bronte's 'Jane
Eyre', C S Lewis, Tolkien). Much of our poetry is based on
iambic pentameter (5 feet, 10 syllables) as in Chaucer,
Shakespeare, Milton, Wordsworth and Yeats. Through
Shakespeare's plays, blank verse became popular (unrhymed
iambic pentameter). Rhyme Royale (seven line stanza) also
uses the significant number seven, probably with royal
connections (James 6th of Scotland, James 1st of England),
although the form dates back to Chaucer.

The Davidian poem uses four lines of 10 syllables (total 40

syllables). The fifth line has seven syllables. The fifth line may
either stand alone, or form part of a cinquain (5 line stanza).
Syllable count: 10-10-10-10-7.

The Davidian does not need end-rhyme, but you must keep to
the syllable count in every verse. You may choose any
combination of rhyming styles, (AABBC, ABABC, ABBAC).
You have forty syllables "a long time" to present your theme,
the seven-syllable line must achieve perfection. You may use a
repeating line, write sequentially, or include a famous quote
from English literature.

7
When you begin your poem with the shorter 7 syllable line, it is
called a Reverse Davidian. Each verse must be the same.

The shortest Davidian is one verse, there is no maximum

number of stanzas, but the distinctive 40 and 7 (10-10-10-10-
7) in each verse. The form ceases to be Davidian when mixed
with other syllable counts and stanzas.

NOTE: Poets in the UK have tried this verse form. It has also
been taken onboard in Metverse Muse, India, where this form
has been featured.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

ALL YOU NEED IS… EDEN (Davidian)

One day, a long time ago,

I considered mother love eternal,
nuclear family, the universe;
a father’s caring arms all-protecting.
Strange how the world and I have grown older.

One day, a long time ago,

I considered the world large, untrammelled,
nuclear holocaust, a fading hell;
a father’s caring arms, like God’s, supreme.
Strange how the world falls out of family.

One day, a long time ago,

I considered parenting, like apples,
male/female hybrid in a fertile plot;
a father’s caring arms and mother’s love.
Strange how fruit-bearing branches spread so far.

One day, a long time ago

I will consider a father’s bruised arms:
the cider keg of special families.
Mother Earth, yet flushed with bright-orb apples –
strange how Eve’s sons regain new Eden’s fruit.

9
‘DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT’
(Davidian)

You say Good Night, the ending of each day

and tuck so tight, no words are left to say.
So gently sleep, then night will be no more,
go softly, slow, sap shoots from heaven’s core.
Good night, but go now, gentle.

You may, good night, rack our last hours in pain,

or gently let our blood to heaven’s vein.
So softly sleep, or fight until all’s done
and tuck so light, for words you’ll find there’s none.
Good night, but go not. Gentle.

ROYAL LEAVEN FOR THE LOAF (Davidian)

Who could predict a nation’s grief might flow

beyond close family and homes we know.
How could our lives, compressed into a span,
stretch century’s birth to every man.
Queen Mother, we miss your smile.

Who could predict dull age would bloom in death

to bunting fit for Sovereign’s gold wreath.
How could earth, pinpricked by Royal leaven,
transform our blue soul-veins - fit for heaven.
Queen Mother, we miss your smile.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

FOR THE WOMEN OF RUSSIA (Davidian)

He knows his children, every one by name,

they are as many as the stars in heaven:
above, a multitude of shining orbs,
lost seas of measured faces in the deep.
Lives too bright to flicker out.

Mother Sarah, safe no more –

for schools are everywhere and children go
and terrorists can plot in any town
and fail to hear, like Abraham heard God,
save Isaac sons to grace our future race.

For in the harvest field the sickle swings

and God will not let fall a single grain
of wheat, but gather it for dough and bread.
Rise, stare at stars beyond your deepest night:
seeds of life will feed a host.

Mothers strike each candle’s match

and fire the precious light of every child,
so Russian women see the circling stars
and darkness flees in shame from innocence;
for heaven’s countless stars – snuffed out – still shine.

11
SEVEN STAGES OF THE MOON (Davidian)

Seasons of love yet blooming

And I remember as the falling snow

when, dressed in lace and flowers blushing pink,
I braved the freezing season, just to frame
how eager lovers’ hearts melt frozen ice.

Seasons of love yet blooming

And I remember blossom’s May shall fade,

still shifting spring’s young steps to winter’s sheet
and earth to earth, we buried life not love;
a son of Galilee heard Jesus’ call.

Seasons of love yet blooming

And I remember June, the longest day;

all night we stormed, to harbour firstborn’s sea
into his Moses basket, Norfolk’s reeds.
Sunshine and gales freaked August, when we met.

Seasons of love yet blooming

And I remember Blickling’s burnished hues,

lake walks and courting in walled gardens; books,
admiring fireside woodlands, ceiling high.
Such carefree trust. ‘My hair,’ you wooed, ‘brick red.’

Seasons of love yet blooming

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

And is it true, locks fade to Christmas love,

as robin, last-born, scared our seasoned hours?
He could not pipe bright music in dense drifts;
Epiphany, our gift, we brought him home.

Seasons of love yet blooming

And is it true, ‘all’s fair in love and war’?

Our fevered seasons synchronised as one,
to wax and wane, just phases of our moon.
Love’s fickle tides won constancy’s bright stage.

Seasons of love yet blooming

And I remember, snowdrops ever peep,

bright fairies dancing rainbows round each tree
in crocus crowns, enchanting all who glean
jewels of the heart… for seasons never change.

TO BE OR NOT TO BE (Davidian)

Where will I be in ten years?

I hardly know where I will be next week,
yesterday is carefully written down,
tomorrow I might make it up to town.
How can I plan? I don’t know what I seek.

Where will I be? In ten years

I might be dead, or ill, or something worse;
the world out there might have moved in to stay
and England may live only in a play.
Threats civilise no timing, nor each curse –

13
where will I BE in ten years –
and will there even be a homely earth?
I’m living for the moment’s might have been:
my drowning life bleeds past me scene by scene.
Perhaps a World’s Brave News will leave no mirth.

Where’s ‘Will I be?’ In ten years

my children may have failed to fly the nest,
insanity may leave me without care,
inanity descend into a stare
and then, perhaps, I’ll take a well-earned rest.

Where’s Will? ‘I’ll be,’ (in ten years)

‘or I won’t be.’ Such noble questioning,
which fades away like grass and like all life.
All’s Vanity. UnFair in human strife,
when balanced in the final reckoning.

CANDLES ON THE WIND FOR BESLAN (Davidian)

My son ran from school today.

He laughed and skipped and drank to quench his thirst,
he did not run half-naked through the streets,
or drench upon our screens his own lifeblood.
My son ran home, for he was still alive.

My son’s too young for terror,

too young to see the horror of those eyes:
the wildest eyes of humans filled with hate;
the bestial crimes of causes without hope,
of children standing tiptoe for their souls.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

My son will not remember.

For Chechen dreams were murderous, insane
and Beslan’s name will fade to infamy,
leaving empty child-beds; arms – loving – gone.
Withdraw, world lens, the terror of your eyes.

Blood-stench of independence:
for Chechnya grows weaker with each drop
that stains its cause with blood-guilt of world youth
and, godless, sacrifices childish grace.
No kamikaze snuffs these candles out.

Mothers go to school no more

to wave your children at the gate with tears
of pride (you see them bravely stepping in
to nurturing and education’s power
and privilege) that they may grow; excel.

Mothers of earth - safe no more -

for schools are everywhere and children go
and terrorists can plot in any town
and fail to hear their god, like Abraham,
save Isaac sons to grace each future race.

Mothers strike each candle’s match

and fire the precious light of every child,
so Russian women see the circling stars
and darkness flees in shame from innocence;
for heaven’s countless stars – snuffed out – shine bright.

15
TOMORROW I LOVE YOU (Davidian)

I think of curry nights and Footie days,

of TV gardens, DIY and home.
I cheer up when the weather gets me down
and Soaps dance so I never walk alone.
That scene’s for ever England.

I think of marches, bright as daffodils,

of freedom of the Press, past Stars, repeats.
Our pleasant land, though green, shades every dream
and heart beats hope, as seasons blessed with rain.
That scene’s for ever: England.

I think of poppy red and bluebell sky,

of yellow daffs and hawthorn’s blooming snow.
My feet spring names, like lambs, when faith’s renewed
and khaki’s bravest boys scent summer’s air.
That scene’s for ever – England.

FRIENDLY HEAVEN FROM SEASONS PAST

(Davidian)

I could imagine a heaven like that:

like wave on rosy wave of trumpet clouds;
sun’s sheen so bright, no mediocre shades.
A raucous, lurid rhododendron spring,
the past and future blending.

I could imagine a heaven like that –

like a mist springing from manicured lawn
and daisies never out of place among
a bluebell sea, for ever England’s shore.
The past and future blending.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

I could imagine a heaven like that;

like wisteria’s azure - arbour’s surf -
a bench secluded from earth’s harshest stare.
No queues of tourists for a photograph;
the past and future blending.

I could imagine a heaven like that,

like trees of proud magnolias in bloom
and late daffodils virgin as the snow
and buttercups that drop like clotted cream,
the past and future blending.

I could imagine a heaven like that.

Like chinks of classic crockery piled high
and pots of creamy tea and buttered scones.
Friends’ smiles, as fairy cups, when we get home -
the past and future blending.

I could imagine a heaven like that,

when Norfolk’s Blickling Hall may fail to charm
and loved ones wait, but on some distant shore
where life is spring’s eternal psalmody,
the past and future’s blending.

17
DUST AND FLOWERS (Davidian)

You must have been the face to greet my birth,

bright raspberry slashed from your kneaded crust;
as anger from your life daubed all in pain.
Where now that flour? Sifted as your dust.

Your place a window, shuttered.

You must have been that face to charm the lens;

my nappied dumpling, chubby in your stew.
So broad upon our waters, rowing hard.
Freeze-framed, those pictures. Why are there so few?

Your space a window, shuttered.

You must have been so misplaced on your Day,

no trophy-cards to count that I had grown.
My bread and dripping mopped away dull grief;
home cooking’s simply missed when daily known.

No face inside your window.

You are this present mother’s absent mum,

a coq-au-vin delight without a dish.
My sons bake fine eccentric recipes,
as pictures, dust and flowers fade my wish.

No place inside my window.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

GLORIA IN EXCELSIS SOARS TO HEAVEN

(Davidian)

I wandered lonely through the city streets,

observing pigeons fighting for each crumb;
a mess of statues vandalised by blame,
wan droppings daubing whitewash on our needs.
Skies banished from Paradise.

I waited, not at all, for spring to breed,

perceiving TV images’ dull flights;
a mess, our world, still vandalised by pain
and angry dropping aircrafts’ blighted seeds.
Skies crowded and sowing death.

I ambled through my dreams of yesteryear,

till autumn fall was late as wreathes deferred.
Is that the nightingale or lark, newborn?
Spoiling seasons to wean eternal fear.
Skies filled with imagined song.

I bled a robin from my cat today,

suspected drunken wasps, though late, must fall.
Memorials raised hope for life insane
and winter visitors dashed crumbs in play.
Skies cloud dense with autumn shades.

I wandered lovely airs through heaven’s space,

a breeze of art and music’s seven seals;
migrating birds arced nature’s late discord –
bright rainbow pots of gold for every race.
Skies bright with poetic art.

Then nightingales and larks sang ‘Gloria’

and ‘In Excelsis’ robins (crimson) preened
and pigeons (stock as statues) joined the strain:
till every bird sang nature’s Gloria.
Chorus skies of witnesses.
19
HOLY TOKENS OF LOVE (Davidian)
[Inspired by John Donne, The Canonization]

If all of life holds darling its bright start

- elapsed as fading moon days since we met -
not owning bodies’ brushwork, truly loaned,
then love-endearing hearts can never part
for those canonised by love.

If ending’s indefensible, like art,

sketched morning consecration, not sundown.
Fund’s richest patron, blessed in paint’s aureole,
gleams palette’s infinite but sacred tart:
for she’s canonised by love.

If music plays breezed oceans’ beating heart,

fine silence airs a melody’s concerns
of harping harmony, so synchronised,
that instruments play timbre’s muse, uncharted,
for tones canonised by love.

If poetasters savour grace apart,

raise sanctifying blessings, undisguised;
beatified, their prose holds beauty’s flow.
Sprung poesy’s hallowed, rhythm-fresh sweetheart.
Canon law foretokens love.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

IT’S DECEMBER (Davidian)

[Note: ‘Rage’ repeats from ‘Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good
Night’ Dylan Thomas]

Late leaves are falling thick this year, like snow,

in floating light of winter’s glowing gold.
Deep drifting earth of amber’s cheering warmth
then sparks a blaze, too late for bonfire’s flush.
Rage against the dying light.

Viburnum’s floret blush bursts white to shine

in dull and darkened skies of grey and green,
while rhododendron’s slowly fattened buds
soon promise summer’s moist and turgid blooms.
Rage against dark’s coming night.

Sharp frosts have shot begonias to death;

some, cradled in the hay, will bloom next year.
Pot mums have stained their pretty frocks to surf
their laundered tide marks, pegged to autumn’s-course.
Rage a year once cradled, stiff.

It’s cold and still and yet our songbirds bring

their ringing sundown of a year reborn.
Forlorn, no natal star, yet blackbirds tease
where robins, brash as berries, please the scene.
Rage for nature’s stinging night.

All buds and bulbs mark winter’s timely phase

and trace a fine maturing wine, to pour
rich heady scents, enriching longed-for spring.
Romance ferments, with birds, to fevered rage:
effervescent songs of light.

21
LIFE IS LIKE A BUTTERFLY (Davidian)
[Note: Inspired by Ruth Parker’s ‘Poet’ (August 2003, Reach)]

The sun has never been this age before

and by no means, today, can I ask more.
If I live through a hundred years’ lifespan
I cannot gain this day, a son of man.
Heart of a magpie – never.

The moon will wax and wane through fickle nights,

yet these, my eyes, have failed to see such sights.
My ears will never sound such melody
and taste, with age, is merely parody.
Soul of a magpie – ever.

The stars will shimmer new upon my sea

and every moment’s sheen is part of me.
If I could glean perfection’s pristine scent,
I’d paradise each day as heaven-meant.
Courage of a butterfly.

TINA TURNER’S HOT IN MY GARDEN (Davidian)

So play me that song again

and I will blend my memories and fright,
lie toning as each note beats to my soul
and visualise no harmony as whole,
so mute to music’s replay: tragic sight.

Play my imagination,
so I will know there never was a right
and choice flew, like a night-owl screeching loud,
as subdued lamps called every shade a crowd.
I longed for dawn to shout there could be light.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

Tender now, each note is cropped

and bleeds into the sky, a field in blight;
I tread each stubble blade to leave the bed
and flush eternity out of my head.
Too much, I stumble, chaff has blasted might.

I cuddle you, my earth-born;

make mud-pies of the puddle-stars so bright
and cover you with snowdrops blanched each spring,
to teach the bluebells tinkle as I sing
and spread muscari skies in hovered flight.

Paul Simon’s ‘Bridge’ flows nightly -

I damn the volume, rumble eardrums tight,
until I syncretise feint summer’s breeze
and trample twigs. Sun sinks, I’m on bare knees:
strip autumn, dig, plant winter aconite.

CD, buried, cries and plays

pervades my house and garden with delight.
I’m Mozart’s giggling childishness again,
I’m Tina Turner, skin-tight, in the rain…
the sound would linger long into the night.

LANDSCAPE OF BREAD (Davidian)

You bake the focus in my background’s scene,

the oven-rock that rises on flat plain;
smoke figure leading in, until I lean
a panoramic backdrop’s tempting lane:
You are gentle on my eyes.

You are the friendly face within a crowd,

a long-lost childhood placeness in a day;
a music, rich as thunder, thrilling loud,
when all I do is hang on what you say.
You are gentle on my ears.
23
You are the scent of curry, beer or wine;
of sweat, or nightbreath, or the richest urge
to stir in juice that savours your love, mine,
fermenting brew’s aromas as they merge;
you are gentle scent and taste.

You are cool breeze upon my cheek or ear,

soft tickle of fine hair upon my neck;
the scratch of stubble heaving pump-hearts near;
shock-ache of Roman baths, to brook a beck.
You are gentle to my touch.

You are my meteor in a God-filled heaven;

a navigation light to sail past hell.
You dough my flesh into a sweeter leaven;
delicious scent or taste, where all is well.
You are gentlest on my flesh.

DAISY CHAINS IN JANUARY (Davidian)

There’s something in the air today, that’s new,

so light that I could skip and leave all cares.
It could be how the sun is shining bright,
although my cheeks are chill with morning breeze.
There must be something somewhere?

There’s something in the air today, the sky

is bright and light, removed from cloud-low damp.
It could be those absurd but species daffs,
always-early snowdrops, or aconites.
There must be something somewhere…

There’s something in the air and in the soil,

so light that nature’s chain-free with delight.
It could be the first day without foul gales,
or laughter at brash daisies on the lawn.
There must be something, somewhere.
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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

DARKNESS OF BYRON (Davidian)

[Quote from ‘Darkness’ by Lord Byron inspired by the
volcanic eruption of 1816 ‘the year without a summer’]

‘I had a dream, which was not all a dream’

and every word of Byron might reflect
pyres, Ganges-pure, untangling each dredged word:
washed sari flows of bright-dyed tangled threads;
‘A lump of death… of hard clay.’

But dreams are chaos, words screamed in the dark,

and death’s too stark to wrap dulled beauty in.
There’s nothing left but mud pies rigged to Mort,
to mortify the mocking flame of life:
a lump of death, of hard clay.

‘Ships sailorless lay rotting on the sea’

a scourge where tides lay gravely deep in mud.
The full moon lived, not so the surging tide
of dark Tsunami’s Indian Ocean wave.
A lump of death, of hard clay.

THE PERFUME SPILT (Davidian)

[Quote from: ‘The Face’ by Jack Clubb, USA, Rubies in the
Darkness, Summer 2005]

‘What has more fascination than a face’

that fills our treasured vessel with such grace,
to pour, at our Lord’s feet, its every trace
and sanctify the air of loving place?
Eloquence spilling from jars.

What has more assignation than a scent,

that memorises pleasures, lost or lent,
to therapy aroma’s passions, spent,
and perfume dreams that love was heaven-meant?
Eloquence spilling from jars.
25
FROM THE CRADLE TO THE GRAVE (Davidian)

The West is born expecting not to die,

so cradled from the grave of human birth
until the dawn of ageing death, the lie
that they are safe in health, in heaven and earth…
and how simple life appears.

The West is born to travel everywhere:

so deceived by beauty on the glossy page;
until ‘the world’s their oyster’, anywhere
that succulence, or wanderlusts, engage
and how simple life appears.

The West is born expecting pain’s relief:

so palliative care calms tide’s inconstancy,
until the ocean ebbs, consuming grief
that wrecks, yet leaves no trace uncertainty
and how simple life appears.

The West is born expecting freedom’s speech,

so injustice then is silence hard to hear
until the TV lens may, shocking, reach
that crystal flood: humanity made clear
and how simple life appears.

The West is born expecting help and care:

so sanity means breath’s not soon dissolved,
until all precious life has had a share
that safety gives, in joy, when pain’s resolved;
and how simple life appears.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

HUMANITY’S TIDE (Davidian)

There is no reason in the tides of man

or woman, raised as flotsam on the sea.
Can this be all the reason, all of me?
For nothing shades our flimsy brief life span.
The harbour wave has gone now.

There is no reason in the shifting sand

of maps retraced, all-sweeping, without care.
Can this inhuman reason be unfair?
For life is but a season left unplanned.
The harbour wave has gone now.

There is no reason in the storms of life,

where fast shores slow; where aid consumes, bedecked
as fishing rigs, where reason’s dreams are wrecked.
Becalmed upon the charts of human strife.
The harbour wave has gone now.

There is no reason in the waxing moon,

sucked fat with tears and bright eternal beams.
Can reason, waning, leave all as it seems,
for death will claim each one so famished soon.
The harbour wave has gone now.

There is a reason death is born of birth:

we grow within a perfect fluid world.
Can foetal reason breathe room, limbs uncurled?
- Becalmed, our womb-grown souls, to ocean’s worth.
The harbour wave has gone now.

27
SHROUDED LOVE (Davidian)
[Quote: ‘But the corpse, it was sad! Went on dying.’ From
‘Espanā, Aparta De Me Este’ by Caliz César Vallejo (trans.
Robert Bly)]

Our love of the night before was still damp,

holding faded petals of stained laundry,
for yesterday was a long time ago,
suds lost in the hum of the washing machine.
‘But the corpse… went on dying.’

Our love of a hundred nights and mornings,

like sludge after a chilled and frosty fall;
though seasons budded to a brighter spring,
love’s ache had vanished in the common touch.
But the corpse went on dying.

Our love, a thousand dark and stormy nights:

hay tossed to bales of sustenance in barns.
Doors slammed to warm long winter drifts ahead,
passing before the endless sights of guns.
But the corpse went on dying.

Our love, ten thousand strokes of fickle time,

grey flicker of dull TV screens where life
expired before curved query’s feeble eyes,
where common love was death and no hope raised.
But the corpse went on dying.

Our love, a million brushes in God’s hands,

where paint was blood and sweat and sorrow’s tears
and death, uncomely bright as love deceased,
where eyes wrapped shrouded vacancy of touch
and the corpse slowly stood up.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

THREE TIERS FOR BOTTICELLI’S EDEN

(Davidian)

Can love still be in hearts, so long-time met,

so long and yet such captivated joy
and though we soon annoy at foibles’ ways,
there never was another way for us
but bathing in each other.

But bathing in each other

we’ll wash the path ahead – unlike the past –
in tears and giggling laughter and staunch faith,
for paper boats are best for bosom chums;
where surf is plugholed, boats are left to dry.

Scent my damp skin, though sodden tidemarks rage;

rubbed and buffed to pink and smarting nuance,
breathe air inviting as the day we first
touched skin to skin and flesh within to love
while bathing in each other.

While bathing in each other

unclean’s clean; as clean as leper washing
by command, from a power greater than
his own. The lily, olive, rosy skin,
fresh as the daisy he was born to be.

Can love be in the domes our Eden brings?

Can foibles raise a storm, so tropical
that forest downpour bursts a scallop shell
and so we see sweet nothings rising, bare:
fresh bathing in each other?

Fresh bathing in each other,

a Botticelli Venus feasts surprise
beside a marbled David, pure and tall;
for celebrations rise to share a toast
of cake, champagne and flute for ‘His and Hers’.
29
WHEN BEAUTIFUL IS THE ONLY WORD
(Davidian)

Pretty prose at every twist.

I look for less Wordsworthian themes to write
about this mountain valley’s grey-flushed sight.
My chamber pen could dip bog depths of stone,
erupting tissue, magma’s glorious throne.

But I can find no other wordless site

that rises to heaven’s crest as if by right,
in sun or storm, a dinosaur of bones
like bleached lake sheep, or lichened rocks’ dull tones.
Pretty prose at every turn.

Pretty prose at every twist.

A valley like Sahara’s searing heat;
aged mountains, fading quicksand of green feet.
Pipe’s winding stream, iced air in desert nights.
Cars’ winding road, dark-blasted moving lights.

Full 1 in 4 lies Wrynose Pass, complete;

as Hardknott Pass stands 1 in 3, replete.
No view’s extinct, to wing eternal sights
of ancient stones in palette-toning whites.
Pretty prose at every turn.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

WHERE FEAR RESTS (Davidian)

There is no excuse, of course,

for leaving a young woman for dead, for
raising a spectre in the countryside,
where back doors are left open, gossip grows.
Nothing awakens senselessness like waste.

There is no excuse, of course,

for a young mother, bleeding in a lane
in broad daylight, where deeds are less dirty
by night, by highways, by housing estates;
beside slops of putrid humanity.

There is no excuse, of course,

for threatening a child, holding a knife,
slashing decency at the neck, spurting
shock of poppies. Slumping beside a scream
as a toddler learns probabilities.

There is no excuse, of course:

where depth seeps white as imagination,
breeds like weeds, gossips safety’s wall of thorns;
until the blackbird fails to sing or nest.
Excuses? There never could be, could there?

31
CRYSTAL LAKE (Davidian)

Somewhere close to Avalon,

a knight and lady rise out of the lake
of death and deep despair where earth rotates
in Armageddon fury, Arthur’s loss
of innocence and duty at hell’s dross

of apple-bitten Eden.
Long-gone the nakedness of Guinevere,
dew-stepping God’s bright morning atmosphere
where Adam’s angels do not fear raised swords,
crossed banishment of Lady Lake, boat moored.

Spare Isaac’s ram-caught brother

rage-herding dissolution into state.
Daub woad on Esau’s angry shade of hate:
planed to a crystal lake’s Excalibur,
where truth is sheathed in justice and saint spurs

hang as star-shields on a tree.

Now coracle the legend-Celtic past,
where beauty’s scriptures, all recorded, last
until the island sinks to mist awake
beyond Pendragon’s breath where crystals break

dawn’s House of Bread, divided.

Then share the crumbs where famished starvelings feed
and drink the cup where suffering may lead
the blade and chalice, proofed to grail in heaven,
while golden sheaves of corn raise peace as leaven.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

MINIMAL DAVIDIANS (one verse only)

EVERY BREATH YOU TAKE

There’s simply one thing I’m dying to say,

before shock dulls each bleeding autumn day
and mobiles wail, connecting life with death.
Paper ships in puddles; our daily breath.
Mortality: mine, yours, theirs.

FULL OF EASTERN PROMISE

Flowers bright as my imagination,

summer’s bloom in perfect combination;
for Monet will relax, too thralled to paint
and nature’s Evensong will bless a saint.
Packets of seeds – such promise.

PATTING A PASTORAL SHIFT

It was never meant to be:

the bloom of youth and hope of love, all gone.
My song of seasons, crumpled, blotchy, brown.
Perhaps these driftings of my dense dreams leave –
how now, dull cow, discern why I’ve grown weeds.

33
WINTER’S SCRIBE

It seems so long since summer burnt us dry.

The damp is blotting up our bones in cold,
ink days are etched with twigs and sullen bark
and paper-white, we wait for winter drifts.
Falling silently—cool words.

COUNTENANCING ROYALTY

I think I see a likeness in her face,

A growing fifty years or more of grace.
When mourns this nation for our Sovereign Queen,
Shall mothers, hard-pressed, modern, throng that scene?
Royal autumn, soon to fall.

SIMPLY FAILING TO EXIST

You never shook the world, nor your rattle;

such absent eyes, to recognise no face.
Never grew impatient of your prattle,
or Primary, marked bare your new star’s trace.
Simply, you failed to exist.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

THE CRYSTAL CRACKED (Davidian)

I remember that last time

you sat, good like a child, I brushed your hair,
so helpless in night waves that ‘It’s not fair’
and combing wisps to careful parting, fought
your mothering, for shine could not be taught.

I remember that last time

you did not fill your gown, but seemed to shrink
and, Alice, room grown brash, I could not think,
yet pricking, as a hairpin, left that day,
closed white-ribbed curtains finally; so say

I remember that last time.

You floated seas of faces, grey, unknown
and grief swept early, left me grave, alone.
My dreams were paper boats I could not steer,
your silence or my noise grown crystal clear.

I remember that last time.

It’s shattered now, your vase cracked on my shelf;
no sweeter sorrow’s faded petal: health.
Rage, mirror, mist! I comb my hair’s remains,
meet hell’s moored face – shine heaven’s wakened pains.

35
IN THE HANDS OF GOD (Davidian)

Believers know there is a time to die,

when mortal coils are dropped and life’s no more,
when they’re no longer traced in memories
of generations born after they’re gone.
Living fleshed in hands of God.

Believers know that all is birth’s demise:

one moment there; another gone; as wind.
So season’s tides, tsunamis, rise and fall;
then breathe walled cries into another life.
Oceaned in God’s flesh, reborn.

Believers think their death deceases all

who, infidels, raise Gods on foreign shores.
They misread, translate Scriptures into flesh
- untangling the wide world enmeshed in hate;
embodied in Paradise.

Believers, unbelievers know star-time

to boldly go: live/die, to sow or reap;
raise cries for justice on the wings of death,
to weep with those who weep; to shout; to laugh.
God’s bruised hand becomes a fist.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

CHRISTMASES SO LONG AGO (Davidian)

It only seems like yesterday, of course,

that tiny kitchen in a council house.
Bent, with your railway rags, near kitchen floor,
lift-sliding chicken roast through oven door.
Ah, dad, do you remember?

Gas cooker crammed with aluminium pans

and kettle, whistling mad in steaming strands.
The backdoor open wide, not padlocked tight;
a pantry, table, sink and low-watt light.
Ah, dad, do you remember?

Our nostrils, fat with stuffing smells and meat,

marge-mashed potato, gravy, processed peas.
We ached to eat the finest English fayre,
for chicken was, to us, most fowl and rare.
Ah, dad, do you remember?

Those sleeping bags for camping, stuffing rich,

where padding wedged in corners, draughts unstitched:
but Santa always knew what they were for,
I never thought how fat or light they were.
Ah, dad, do you remember?

So magical each Christmas morning, we

crawled in and rummaged to the feet to see
and feel that rustling wrapping paper, shock
to toys and stocking treats to eat, or books…
Ah, dad, do you remember?

You hung the fairy lights across the room

and balanced cards along the wire to form
a garland to retrieve - the same each year -
with silver-glittered tree, such sparkling cheer.
Ah, dad, do you remember?

37
My sister glowed with pride, just sweet sixteen,
her infant fat with gurgles; nappy beams.
We smiled at crackers, childish ‘uncle’, ‘aunt’;
such seasoned families could never part.
Ah, dad, do you remember?

Balloons and paper chains, what could there be

but carols, baby Jesus, Queen at three?
A virgin mother, fine, on Christmas cards –
absenting heaven, earth, and yet not hard.
Ah, dad, do you remember?

I cannot touch a bauble without thrill

and tinsel, rich as taste, is with me still.
The glow of coloured lights, as fairy stars,
‘home for Christmas’ could never be so far.
Ah, dad, do you remember?

Each time I touch a coloured sherry glass,

fine Harvey’s pouring shape glows Christmas-vast.
The cabinet is open, ritual fresh
and sleigh bells jingle Santa’s eve afresh.
Ah, dad, do you remember?

And now my infants holy, infants mild,

are challenge-fat to ritual’s hopeful child.
They leave out stockings, sherry, cool mince pies,
for natal charm stars all our Christmas highs.
Now, dad, you must remember.

Each Santa adds choice fayre to his long list,

and Rudolph gets the carrots he’s been wished.
So sleigh bells ring and jingle round our tree
until their Christmas child is there to see.
And, dad, will you remember?

END OF DAVIDIAN SECTION

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

MAGI, New verse form 2003 by Wendy Webb

‘Wise Men’ Poems

It is not known whether there were three Wise Men – the Bible
simply names the number of gifts (three). It is not known
whether Jesus was born in a stable – the Bible simply says the
baby was laid in a manger and there was no room at the inn
(typical households of the day included a manger for the
animals brought indoors for the night).

Following a short pilot of a new verse form, organised through

Norfolk Poets and Writers, has now launched a new verse
form, MAGI ‘Wise Men’ Poems (2003). Wendy created the
DAVIDIAN (2002) new verse form and was looking for a
simple modern format for poets, in print or on the Internet.
MAGI uses the number THREE, hence the name based on the
celebration of the Magi, or Wise Men, at Epiphany (January
6th, the end of the Christmas season).

To produce a MAGI, poets write a poem of three words per

line, three lines per verse, and three verses complete the poem.
There is no syllable count, punctuation should be minimal and
end-line rhyme is not necessary (optional). The poem should
also use just one vivid image throughout. Any theme may be
suitable for a MAGI; it is not necessary to write about the Wise
Men or about Christmas.

Writing a MAGI appears simple, but with few words, each

must count. Line breaks or rhymes must be intentional and
the poem must read as a poem and not prose. Variation in
form is created through words of different lengths or syllable
counts. The complete poem will display easily on one Internet
web page, or on a Christmas or greetings card.

NOTE: A WRITERS’ GROUP IN SOUTHPORT ENJOYED

USING THIS SIMPLE FORM. IT’S ALSO USEFULLY FITS
ON A GREETINGS CARD.

39
SERPENT’S KISS (Magi)

Snow White’s glass

case where beauty
slept peacefully still

immaculate and wholesome

dwarfing the world’s
poisonous red apple

shameless loving kiss

broke impurity’s spell
unlike womanly Eve

HARMLESS AS ART (Magi)

Harmless as art
making a statement
in the nude

full as breasts
dripping mother earth
wrapping air’s nurture

thalidomide has never

sung so loudly
in Trafalgar Square.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

BREATH’S GAZING POOL (Magi)

Away one day

one night. Wordlessly
disturbing eyes alight:

clear bottomed pool

filters breathless patterns;
senses sightlessly creative.

Love, inhaling, sings.

Breaks intimacy’s distance
to passion’s spell.

ASTROLOGER OF FATE (Magi)

Chancing long lifeline,

she would live
ninety six years

listening to seas,
not palm reader’s
tidings. Buoyancy aid:

ninety six years…

Fickle full moon
flotsam, she survived.

41
BIRD TABLE SCRAPS (Magi)

Twinkle little star

Small and bright,
Chaffinch breasts Mars.

Fat round moon

Changeable as feeds,
Woodpigeon bullies, breeds.

Sunset on leaves
Burnishing autumn feasts –
Robin glows independence.

ECLIPSING A NEW EARTH (Magi)

It’s darker now,

sun’s late and
sky’s pregnant grey.

Baby will turn,

descend Suez Canal.
Eclipse the moon.

Only a day
to transform humanity,
deliver hope’s resolutions.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

FORGETFUL AS THE STARS (Magi)

So silently then
majestic as birth
imploding on time

Star flickering gold

hay’s scented worship
stenches dulling myrrh

Mundane herds forget

suck milky pillows
Sleep, infant royal.

HELIGAN’S GIANT MERMAID (Magi)

Dreaming of seas
she’s woodland-rocked,
telling no tales.

Heligan’s giantess awakes.

Eve’s modern paradise
lures Green Man.

Sleep on mermaid;
your floods revive
each woodland nymph.

43
HOPE’S ETERNAL SPRING (Magi)

Pools of calm
like imaginary oases –
mirages in deserts

and aridity blooms

as falling rain:
Nile’s delta floods,

evaporating joyless drudgery

to hope’s renewing
sands of time.

MAGI OF THE SEA (Magi)

Large, healthy Westerners,

- richly stressed, depressed -
searching for sunshine’s

seaside beach holiday.

Small framed Asians
recovering them safely.

Will we bury
their Tsunami dead
with such grace?

44
WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

STARGAZING MAGI (Magi)

Beautiful as starlike
thrusting comet, satisfied
love, abandoned auriole.

Standing under sky,

dark lifting desire:
pinpricks scorching infinity.

Hands gently starring

love’s countless generations
- life’s immeasurable gift.

TENDER NARCISSUS’ SCENT (Magi)

I love you
said so simply,
a consummate vase.

I love you:
paper whites’ scent
sharing sensuous meals.

I love - you
never; fade softly
spring’s eternal dream.

45
WE SEE THREE SHIPS (Magi)

Shepherds’ field, star

rising like pantomimes
painting season’s gold.

Three ships approach

royal virgin blue -
east’s sandy ocean.

Scent of oranges,
massaging olive oil -
frankincense denying myrrh.

WINTER GARDEN (Magi)

Winter’s bare bones:

structure of fences
trees’ spines undressed

grasses shimmering dampness

robust, shapely evergreens
seedheads beguiling death

mahonia’s brash sunbeams

viburnum’s blush dawn
bewitching red Diane.

46
WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

DROWNING AUGUST SUN (Magi)

strange how powerful

words can beam
raze a bridge

crowded for pilgrimage

ever flowing Tigris
receiving women children

worshippers suicide bombers

rumoured words drowning
flaring hateful racism

DUOMO SANTA MARIA DEL FIORE, Cathedral,

Florence (Magi)

Proud Cathedral city

flowering Mary’s religion;
classically Renaissance art.

Simplest tallest grandeur

silences faint babble
within fat walls.

Campanile, dome, facade:

marbled petals’ blossoming
fleur-de-lys.

47
MAGI OF PEACE (Magi)

Peace, the flower,

every peaceful day
in the garden.

War in peace:
when warring weeds
die first, unflowered.

Seasons of peace,
reasons for war
sadly flowers fall.

MAGI OF ABSENCE (Magi)

Death, beautiful as
absence: after incense
pervades the air.

Scent to sense,
that, seeing, scents
air’s pregnant beauty.

Death’s present absence

pervades unseeing air,
sensing heaven’s beauty.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

MAGI OF LOVE (Magi)

Love, like cherry

blossom: pink May,
visualised all year.

Worth waiting, worth

seeing, worth falling
head over heels.

Trampled like confetti:

summer’s green plenty,
budding winter hope.

ABBEY GROUNDS, WALSINGHAM (Magi)

Snow had fallen

snow drop snow
snowdrops dropping snow

immaculate grey day

blue with cold
robed virginal sky

earth, leaves, buds

shivering pregnant goosebumps
to spring fulfilment

END OF MAGI SECTION

49
ECHOTAIN, New verse form 2004 by
Wendy Webb

ECHOTAIN poems (2004, Gk ‘ekhe’) celebrate our God-given

right as human beings, created and beautiful. NOTES: Ekhe =
sound (Gk), or Echo (Gk myth of nymph spurned by Narcissus,
until only her voice remained). See also echolalia (speech
therapy term, sounds echoed back without meaning;
recognised in various conditions, including autism). Echo
rhyme (‘Writing Poetry’ Doris Corti, 1994), echoism
(onomatopoeia to form words).

ECHOTAINS are written about any aspect of self image (body,

soul or spirit) and must celebrate beauty in humanity.
They must not preach, denigrate or accept without question
the modern world of the celebrity (beautiful people, perfect
form). ECHOTAINS celebrate experience, life, family and
achievement against all odds. They also celebrate human life
itself, the tapestry of creativity, knowledge and loving
acceptance.

To write an ECHOTAIN you may choose any form (fat, thin,

tall, short) that carries its own internal unity, rhymed or
unrhymed. It must not be a concrete poem where shape
represents the subject. Do not use start-line capitals, except
for punctuation. Your poem should be centred, but line ends
must be clearly deliberate. If you break a line simply to create
the shape, then your poem has failed. If your poem is not
pleasing to the eye, but unified within itself, it has succeeded.

Repetition, echoes or rhythm are very important to an

ECHOTAIN. No title should be used, but the first three words
of the poem may stand out as a headline (bold, etc). For the
sake of editors, an ECHOTAIN POEM should be neither longer
nor wider than one side of A5 (maximum 36 lines, and 12
words at widest point).

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

ECHOTAIN (I love myself)

I
love
myself
for
everything I could be but am not
I
love the image that I cannot be
I
love you for the self I might have been
and everyone has celebrated you not me.

I love myself and cannot see you bare

or know the beauty you disguise
because your vision might be
seeing me.

I love
humanity
and love
means
loving me.

NOTE: CENTRED POEMS AREN’T POPULAR (UNLESS

ESSENTIAL TO THE POEM’S LAYOUT E.G: SOME
CONCRETE POEMS). ALSO, ECHO SOUNDS CAN BE USED
IN MANY POEMS. THE IDEA OF THE ECHOTAIN WAS TO
GET CREATIVE WITH LAYOUT – SO LOOK AT THE MANY
FORMS THAT HAVE DEVELOPED AROUND THE WORLD;
MAKING FULL USE OF LAYOUT. BUT, BEWARE, IF THE
LAYOUT IS HARD FOR EDITORS TO REPRODUCE, THEN
YOUR POEM IS UNLIKELY TO BE ACCEPTED.

51
ECHOTAIN (Religious people)

Religious people
sometimes need
affirmation of their worth.

Some fail to see another birth,

so long ago
in foreign dirt,
could bleat its message to the stars
in mute and humble vacancy -
its rainbow arched to heaven.

A little lamb was lifted high

and could not see the flock surrounding it.
A shepherd’s shoulders
muscled time,
created pens where sheep could rest;
all day he trudged the path behind his back.

He filled his hay-sack

fat with ninety-nine,
and, as Ben boomed the eleventh hour,
he turned again to rescue one

‘Little Lamb’ -
Blake’s tiger in disguise.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

ECHOTAIN (A stray)

A stray
comment
and panic floods in drowning surf,
pounding beats
netted like a shoal upon the waves.

A stray
within the crowding mutuality of life
and fish alone are eaten by the beasts,
darkly waiting,
teeth as traps.

A minnow
soon extinguished in the flow
breeds as a rainbow
trout in dancing shades - of lights splashed in the stream.
Its spirit fights anew and never dies.

53
ECHOTAIN (Ruth)

Ruth.
Widow in a foreign land,
a land where strangers glean a wage
and wager with the seeds of plenty:
produce a little loaf of bread
for mother’s empty apron strings –
as welcoming as Boaz.

Ruth,
enduring as her start, a Moabite,
in blessings for the ending of each day;
sacrificing daily youthful fancy
and fancying the patriarchal skirts,
she wraps night warmth in a blanket of Boaz.

Ruth:
she lays her booth as harvest tent,
in Jewish celebration of her God.
Long before the Feast of Booths,
she grieves no foreign first fruits
- faces the ending of her life -
and vows each imprint’s footprint in her sand.

Sands of time repeat Ruth’s vow:

her God, our God,
her land, our land,
her people’s people;
David, yet a twinkle in these matriarchal eyes,
sings psalms of celebration to Naomi’s harvest time –
Ruth’s son’s, son’s, son, a ‘House of Bread’.
Her ending is his genesis… a new beginning.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

ECHOTAIN (Sheep)
Sheep, every day,
sheep, like clouds scudding skywards.
Across the valley: sheep,
her sheep.
He counted them nightly in his dreams.
Sheepishly he penned a plan
to round them up with sheepdog skills,
as he whistled loud at bleating air
and slept the shepherd’s sleep dip
of mangers at shearing time.

Carefully he laid the feed

in sheepish letters on his hill:
‘I love you’ spread his woollen yarn,
‘be mine…’ for cloven hooves to tread;
he tended sheep at feeding time.
Across the valley: scudding sheep,
her sheep flocked in, but his spread out
to feed on sheepish dreams – and crook
his ewe into a shepherd’s arms
and count no sheep at night.

And though she read his woolly flock

of loving letters, penned by hooves,
poor Cupid had shot wide his mark –
her heart was counting cowherds at the farm.
Our woolly ram shall end this tale,
for Eros, with his quiver fat,
will find a feckle, fatted ewe
who soon will not be counting sheep.
All night her ram will shear her heart;
at lambing time she’ll count – like you –
how full his quivered love must be,
if he can bleat ‘Be mine’ by day
and knit a woolly jumper every night.
55
ECHOTAIN (SUN RISES)

Sun rises
after days of February cold
and cold blooms open,
wide open in dancing smiles.

Blooms raise their faces

like the sun on a bright March morning
and shivers vanish
and no cold seeps through gloved hands
and jackets are discarded, dripping,
as gardeners rake and dig the ground for life.

Shoots rise, bright as spring,

and there’s a spring in the step as doors slam,
or – winter’s shock – are left wide,
wide open to lunch. Ajar
to raucous crows and gentle doves
and tradition dictates:

‘March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb’

but there are no lions in the garden this year,
only the hope of wild sunflower manes rising,
no bleating lambs, just cooing doves
and gentle, gentle flowers.

Spring’s cold no longer tremors bones,

just blushing green and red
and white and yellow
and yellow faces warm beneath the sun
and open, all like purses full of change
and human life is golden for a time
and livered skin, no longer pursed,
shines like the morning sun
at spring’s first smile.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

ECHOTAIN (THE FLUTIST, SAN GIMIGNANO)

[Note: In honour of Reno Schulz, Flutist, San Gimignano]

Wind music flooded down the walls and round

and washing round piazza’s ancient square.
The sky was but a million miles away
and miles away
the panorama spun.

No fresco sighs on church walls now sufficed,

sufficient as high altar’s ancient cry,
tuned to a sacristy or waterfall,
the waterfall of music
tumbled down.

The stones cried depths as vast as city walls;

wall towers, 14 towers, rang out loud
as 70, by history renowned.
Renowned, the gongs;
San Fina donged full twelve.

Thus flouting Italy, the flutist roamed,

Rome’s gentler native German swayed in time.
His energy, spent sap with olives crushed,
crushed Indian airs;
to curried harmonies.

He breathed his last; stood tall, but not so proud,

a proud and fruiting vine-ripe smile, with ease.
Charm settled, with his music, arts’ fine home:
fine homely peace
replayed from Tuscany.

57
ECHOTAIN (Strangers’ Hall)

There is no stranger place than Strangers’ Hall

among the strangest streets and names of Norwich
where merchants – strange - were made to feel at home,
now children backpack friendly history
with pens and clipboards and binoculars
to follow – on safari – in its walls
and, strangely, seek a dog within a frame
or cat or necklace or some strange nick-nack
that hides dull fun in cabinets, to hunt
and draw and colour in the darksome past.
Priests lived, Italians sculpted and yet now:
within this hall, flag floor and gallery-fat walls,
it’s strangely nice to call all tourists friends
by welcoming them into Strangers’ Hall.

ECHOTAIN (The world revolves)

The world revolves in pain,

the world revolves
and I can see no faint
faint beauty of earth’s glow
in spacelessness and time,
when all I see is red, revolving pain.

The world revolves insane,

the world revolves
and I can hear no faint
faint harmonies of earth
in timelessness and space,
when all I hear’s dischordant plucking pain.

The world revolves in pain.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

ECHOTAIN (At Horsey Mere)

Merely shaping favoured Guinevere

to Horsey’s Camelot-tales of womanhood:
no time to canter among the reeds
in rising heat of summer’s height,
seeking hides and spying birds.
When this bird side-saddles a feminine mount,
armoured in outsize lifejacket,
gently rocked by breezing mere…
a sailor rocks and lance-rows manhood,
charges across to gentler reeds and sun, beating sun
on golden hair, cheeks flushed with pregnancy.
Whinnied satisfaction, eight-months’ ripe like handkerchief
speared, labouring not a muscle in the midwife of a hull
to consummate eyes of love.

Golden fulfilment of Horsey Mere

rocking and rowing to a gallop
as the late sun cools
to skittish breeze, worrying foul-mood surface,
a mere hint of concern
whether oars could spur faster, fleeter,
slicing surf to stress swords’ homeward shore;
to moor along the creek of Horsey Windmill.
A picture postcard token scene
for tea or ice creams’ gentle drift
of muscles sheathed but wasted
like Lancelot’s gallantry.

END OF ECHOTAIN POEMS

59
SESTEENSY, Poetry Variation of the Sestina,
2004 by Wendy Webb

ARC OF PROMISE (Sesteensy)

Sometimes rumours are more fearful than news

sometimes words slice unsaid, unlike a knife
some deeds, undead, carry life; dead deeds, none.
Satiate fears, so reality weeps
laugh so that shock may dance in deepest night
then peace will soon descend, so like our love.

Commit to memory bread-days of love

or hearts will read its warmth as stalest news.
Think leaven’s love in death as hours of night
when silence cuts pale flesh so like a knife.
Now taste a love that dances as fear weeps
and sates the grave, to minute power or none

upon our war-torn earth, again as none

that cannot be resolved by greater love.
So why does fear, unfurled, live where hope weeps
upon the wings of ravens, arcing news,
to scavenge where dull vultures flesh each knife
and laugh big brothers into shock-dulled night.

Love dances fearful 9/11s night -

dove-news with olive branches - grave when none
weeps joy in shadow’s fear, and each crossed knife.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

The SESTINA uses 39 lines of iambic pentameter, with 6

sestets (6 line verses) followed by an envoi (of 3 lines), with a
pattern of repeating end-line words.

The revised (2004) form of the sestina has simplified this

pattern to just 3 sestets, completed by the envoi. The
grapevine pattern of repeating words is followed for the end-
words of each sestet. The envoi must include all 6 repeating
words, in any order chosen by the poet. This form of the
SESTINA is completed in just 21 lines of iambic pentameter
(*iambic tetrameter may also be used).

NOTE: I LOVE THE SESTINA AS A COMPLEX BUT

REWARDING FORM. HOWEVER, I WANTED TO
EXPERIMENT WITH A SHORTER POEM (THAN THE
TRADITIONAL 39 LINES). HOWEVER, THERE ARE MANY
OTHER POETRY FORMS YOU CAN TRY WITH A GREAT
VARIETY POEM LENGTHS, LINE LENGTHS, RHYMING
SCHEMES, ETC. THE UNIQUENESS OF THE SESTINA
LIES IN THE USE OF STRONG END-WORDS, THAT TAKE
SO MANY REPETITIONS; AND IT ALSO AVOIDS END-
LINE RHYME.

END OF SESTEENSY

61
ANDROPIAN New verse form 2005 Wendy Webb

ANDROPIAN POEM (2005) devised by is based on St

Andrew’s cross (Patron Saint of Scotland) or Saltire. Andrew
was the first disciple of Jesus. Andreas (Gk), meaning male.
Note: the name of this poetry form is based on the Greek
words:
Anthropos (man), Andreas (male) and Androgynous
(male/female).
The TITLE is used in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th syllable of lines
1-5, then reversed in lines 6-9. Each word is then repeated as a
reflection, to form the right hand side of the X-shaped cross.
It is not necessary to centre your text, unless this complements
your poem. You may wish to emphasise the words forming the
X-shape cross, though this is not necessary except for training
purposes.
Flexibility of repeating and mirror words is allowed, so is
onomatopoeia.

Alternatively, you may omit all syllables outside of the X-shape

cross (as in the second example); this will emphasise the
acrostic nature of your poem. You would then count out your
repeating words by beginning lines 1-5 with the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th
and 5th syllable, and finishing lines 6-9 in reflection.

The crux word in line 5 may be one or more syllables and this
word pivots the entire theme of the poem. You may use any
line length, provided it complements the X-shape cross.

Try out the ANDROPIAN POEM for yourself – take care with
repeating and reflective words – and it’s much harder than it
appears! The meaning of your poem is crucial to succeed with
this form.

See also the notes on the formal version of the ANDROPIAN

POEM. This simplified informal version of the ANDROPIAN
POEM uses a simple X-shaped cross, referring to St Andrew
(patron saint of Scotland). ANDROPIAN uses the Greek words
62
WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

Andreas (male) and anthropos (man) and androgynous

(male/female). Note: The CROSS shape may be visible
(concrete shape) OR hidden, but good poetry (meaning and
flow) takes precedence over final shape.
(1) The 1st and last echo words of line one are repeated in the
9th (last) line. This word, together with the middle word in line
five, form the basic shape of the X-shaped cross (they may be
emphasised for training purposes, but you may prefer to left-
align your finished poem).
The 1st word in line one and the middle word in line five form
the title of your poem. You may create a rhymed or unrhymed
version of your poem, centred or left-aligned, avoiding first
line capitals except for punctuation. Note: Syllable count is
not essential to an Andropian, however:-
(2) You may emphasise the X-shape of the cross by reducing
syllable count to the second TITLE word in line five , for
example: 10, 8, 6, 4, 2 (3 or 1, depending on central word),
then reversing (4, 6, 8, 10) in lines 6-9 until you reach the
repeating word in line nine; this completes your poem. You
may choose a left-aligned poem (3), if preferred. See examples
(above/below):-

63
SEE PROMENADES (Version 1) (Andropian)

See where the tide enthrones a town at sea

and contemplate the ragged shape of land
and you will find that man’s designs are bland,
while architecture rocks humanity.
Man raises promenades to walk secure,
such shore’s defences breach urbanity.
Crude penile piers seed ocean’s mermaid hand,
set coastal towns in amber’s fragile sand –
see how Canute holds back his tide at sea.

NOTE: In this example, the title is formed from the middle

word of the middle line AND the first word which repeats to
form the Saltire Cross-shape.

SEE PROMENADES (Version 2) (Andropian)

See where the tide enthrones a town at sea,

eroding ragged shapes inland,
not man’s designs, but rocks.
Architecture’s
promenades;
defensive shores
of piers, men and mermaids.
Coastal towns fix amber’s frail sands -
see how Canute cannot hold back this sea.

NOTE: In this example, a half-X shape is visible, and lines

reduce from the longest in line one, to the shortest in line five.
The title is again taken from the X shape. The poem has been
left-aligned in this example.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

SEE PROMENADES (Version 3) (Andropian)

See where the tide enthrones a town at sea,

eroding ragged shapes inland,
not man’s designs, but rocks.
Architecture’s
promenades;
defensive shores
of piers, men and mermaids.
Coastal towns fix amber’s frail sands -
See how Canute cannot hold back this sea.

NOTE: In this example of the Andropian form, the full Saltire

Cross is clearly visible. Each line reduces from line one until
the crux, its narrowest point, before widening again towards
line nine. The title is taken from the Cross-shaped words.
There may be a syllable count, ensuring the word in line five
is between one and three syllables.

GIVE LIFE BY GIFTING OURSELVES (Andropian)

Give, like it is our food to always give;

life is the price, the bread of life
by ransom. All we buy
- gifting earth’s gift –
ourselves.
Gifts, priceless gifts,
buy riches. Hope stands by
life, dusting gems to shine with life.
Give, for our ashes scatter as we give.

65
FLAG BLUE, AGED-WHITE SAINT (Andropian)

Flag for St Andrew, patron saint, we flag

blue seas for Scotland, deepest blue,
aged rocks and lochs and aged
white clouds, snow white
saint-like
white cross, roads white.
Aged lairds, young bairns, seas’ aged
blue skies for Scotland’s earth, mist blue,
flag Galilee’s deep blue: boat, net and flag.

NOTE: The Andropian form may be a concrete poem, where

the X-shape is used to signify a vote, a cross, a mistake, a
crossroads, etc. In this example, the most difficult to recreate
precisely, every line uses a reflected word at the end of each
line. Every first word forms the title, and must make sense.
The end-word reflects the first-word in every line; although
spelling may vary, or meaning. Making sense is paramount.
In this poem, each line reduces, to form the X-shape.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

SALT SEASONED (Andropian)

Salt for table, or cooking with sea salt;

cellar’s preserving / pickling / smoked.
Salt dough’s baked ornaments.
Flavoursome food -
seasoned.
Tides’ savoured sands:
sea stocks, or freshwater.
Sand castles, sand art, sand dunes, sandy soil:
salt of the earth weathers all life in salt.

SEASONS FOCUSED (Andropian)

Seasons, in every year new seasons

marking change of fashion, form,
colours to new looks
dating trends;
focused
prism-rich,
splitting time’s rainbows:
absences of light, of dark,
seasoned statements of time-line seasons.

67
SUN RISES, DAWN LIGHT SHINES (Andropian)

Sun sets upon each day, so like the sun

which rises to all life and rises new,
and, when dawn bleeds its shades on dawning man,
a glass splits light and bursts light rainbow bright.
So character shines in humanity
and woman’s light, as man’s light, blesses earth.
Shades of dawn’s persona adorns their bloom
and rises, fragrant as life raises hope.
Sun’s setting splendour, fading like life’s sun.

NOTE: An Andropian form may internalise the X-shape, so

that the title clearly follows the X-shape, although it is
surrounded by other words, so on first glance it does not
appear to be an Andropian. The words must make sense,
they may be emboldened to emphasise the Saltire Cross, the
poem may be left-aligned or centred.

JOURNEY SPHINX-LIKE (Andropian)

Journey to the intimate, brave journal

of mummified remains on earth.
Posterity preserved
in pyramids.
Sphinx-like,
rage life’s riddle:
Maternal swaddling love
pricks a lion’s lethal complex…
Journal of family’s brutish ‘Journey.’

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

EASTER PILGRIM: CRADLED HOPE RELEASED

(Andropian)

Easter is the time our gaze turns east:

pilgrim bright dawn and pilgrim
cradled man. Cradled
hope from hope’s
release:
hope’s grave hope,
cradle stalled. Cradled
pilgrim gardener, pilgrim
east. Discarded shroud-bursting Easter.

SIMPLE BRIEF: KNOW ONE TOO (Andropian)

(for Margaret)

Two loves she had in life, they loved her too:

one heart, one love, each into one.
No heartache – loss – to know,
brief as life’s brief.
Simple
brief poem’s brief:
know your heart, cross out ‘No’.
One’s innocence, so easy, won
to love and live, in verse, for others too.

NOTE: This Andropian spells out the TITLE from the crux
word in line five, and every line mirrors the first/last word.
The shortness of form, together with detailed planning of a
poem, makes this suitable for a card dedication.

69
VOTE SAINTLINESS (Andropian)

Vote allegiance to a candle’s votive

message: sparked for solemn requiem.
Pontiff soon beatified,
igniting blissful
saintliness.
Electioneering
sinfulness of tarnished dreams.
Mixed messages: Prince to Pauper’s vow.
Votive death soon flames parsimony’s vote.

WAR ON WANT (Andropian)

No we don’t want bully war and, yes, we know

fair fighting’s never fair,
not now, not then, not
ever; never
free.
Never ever,
not now, not then, not
fair; fighting’s never fair.
Knowing want’s a bully, warring yes and no.

NOTE: This Andropian has ignored the TITLE rule, but

experiments with meanings of no / know.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

PEPPER CELLAR (Andropian)

Pepper on the table, mill-ground pepper

like a salt cellar, seasoned
to enunciate,
relish speech.
Cellar
peppered by
bullets, bullshit, mould, mews;
musty, meaningless, moribund.
Peppered extinction, flavourless pepper.

PERFUMED WORDS (Andropian)

Rose words scent across garden. Water rose

rains fresh air where flowers reign,
thorns soft as thornless
fruit, drunk fruit,
sweet
nectar-rich
bees drunkenly buzz.
Reign-fresh air where wordsmiths rain
rose pot pourri compost: unscented rose.

NOTE: This Andropian uses a separate title, but follows the

simplest rules for the form: a poem of NINE lines, where lines
one and nine repeat the same word in the first/last word of
these two lines. This is the basic Saltire Cross. It is a concrete
poem, suitable to depict a kiss, a cross, or a vote.

END OF ANDROPIAN POEMS

71
FRESCO, New verse form 2006 by Wendy Webb

The FRESCO (2006) new poetry form, uses the fusion between
one colour and a building or sculpture. It is inspired by the
chemical reaction that takes place in a fresco (wall painting) as
the plaster dries, bonding the colour within.
To write a FRESCO, choose any building (inside or out) or
piece of architecture or sculpture; think in one colour that will
cause a ‘chemical reaction’ in the reader. The fusion (poem)
may be centred or left-aligned.
Art or repeating words (the colour) may be used to emphasise
the colour, providing it enhances the poem.
A FRESCO may fill the wall / ceiling (page) like the Sistine
Chapel, or a simple poem shape; however, rhythm and flow of
the poem must not be sacrificed.

Other examples you may wish to try:-

Inside St Peter’s, Rome = pewter
‘Last Judgement’, Sistine Chapel = midnight blue
Nelson’s Column, London = ash
Florence Cathedral = pink
Above Notre Dame, Paris = crystal (clear/opaque)
Inside the N.R.M., York = Coal black
Dove Cottage, Grasmere = Slush; or Orange
Westminster Cathedral, London = warm marble.
Poetry form devised by (2006).

The FRESCO works best when using one vivid colour, but
varying the description of colour by careful rewriting.
Writing about a modern sculpture would be as acceptable as
writing about an ancient building’s interior.

NOTE: The fresco, using ONE intense colour and ONE intense
object/body part/not necessary a building or sculpture!

72
WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

DAVID AND SIGNORIA (Fresco)

Gold, like blushed aureole

dancing light on stone,
deep as Petra’s caves,
tall as a ghost city;
welcoming as Italy.
No treasure from a Wise Man
glows acceptance, future muscle.
No angel choirs to harp
or mark earth beside still waters.
Marble dances among warm scrolls
papyrus-rich with glowing verse.
Unroll the scroll and trace feint Hebrew script.
David welcomes, any way you look,
his piazza manhood streets ahead;
gleaming pure backdrop.
Sweet as rose water.

SILENT CANARIES (Fresco)

His skin as buttermilk, in curds and whey of spots,

as sunbeams dull his frown and thrashing voice
to depths of hair, brushed aside before the razor dims to skull.
His arms as glowlights of new growing muscle,
and soft sunlight ridges corn-silk shading light.
His teeth as lemon ice, to sting and clench
a champagne of fermented sound, poured broad.
His lips as mustard, sunflowers in the hedge,
turning, turning in a solar star,
of shooting rigid fallout, soft as sand.
Grazing pale morning sun with lemon zest
of chardonnay, poured and full, awaiting
a mother’s lips, twitching in golden showers
of his warm, deep yellow blows.
Canaries pulsing on her breath of silence
as his soft lemon fist-prints bruise to blooms.
73
VARIATION OF DAVID AND SIGNORIA

rosegold
rose Gold, like blushed aureole rose
gold dancing light on stone, gold

rose deep as Petra’s caves, rose

gold tall as a ghost city; gold
rose welcoming as Italy. rose
gold No treasure from a Wise Man gold
rose glows acceptance, future muscle. rose
gold No angel choirs to harp gold

rose or mark earth beside still waters. rose

gold Marble dances among warm scrolls gold
rose papyrus-rich with glowing verse. rose
gold Unroll the scroll and trace feint Hebrew script. gold
rose David welcomes, any way you look, rose
gold his piazza manhood streets ahead; gold
rose gleaming pure backdrop. rose
gold Sweet as rose water. gold
rosegold

END OF FRESCO POEMS

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

TRIPTYCH, New verse form 2006 Wendy Webb

There are many modern layouts of free verse poems, including

two or three column poems. Apart from this, there are
examples of poems which use the three perspectives of a
Triptych. Art also uses three portraits, or angles, on one
subject, and may then be called a Triptych.
The development of the rules of form for the Triptych (2006)
are based on ancient works of art used as altarpieces (a
Triptych). A rhyming scheme has also been used, together
with a weave pattern to form three columns (left, right, middle
columns; in that order). However, variations have been
acknowledged in this pamphlet, allowing modern poets to
experiment with their preferred display of a Triptych Poem.
Like paintings from The National Gallery, formed in three
panels (usually as an altarpiece). The poem should have form,
flow and rhythm (iambic pentameter or tetrameter provide a
useful starting point) and must rhyme. The finished poem
must be rearranged into three clear columns, but careful
attention must be given to the sound and visual effect this
creates. Punctuation should be minimal for this form.
Recommended for shorter poems only, due to complexity of
this form.
You will notice that some poets have achieved complete poems
in their ‘side panels’, as well as a workable woven effect with
the ‘main panel’.

75
SLUMBERING SIENA CHERUBS (Triptych)
Fan well streets to keep my cool. Siena,
Ancient where street acts play the fool. your paths,
Branch out, they route us back to school. wind well,

Above where it’s far to fall, piazza,

in Italy, a great town hall so tall,
stamped far below where pigeons call. postage,

Your days are now a fantail closed, of fame

for pigeons where the square is hosed. dropping
Cool fountain where whitewashed cherubs dozed. boasts

NOTE: This is the first poem created in the Triptych Form (2006). It uses a
weave pattern of ‘left, right, middle’, read line by line, where the line ends
with rhyme in the middle column. The form displays using three separate
columns.

MOMENT IN THE STARS (Triptych, alternative)

O heaven in a moment from above
little earth a stage where thy
town wrapped in sleep deep
of infant innocence and
Bethlehem a focus where Paradise lies dreamless

how peaceful sleeping still sleep

still as the rising star the
‘we’ standing silent

see weakly wrapped stars

thee swaddled in a manger: go

lie where hay scents by

NOTE: In this alternative form of the Triptych, three separate columns are
used, but there is no weave pattern. The side panels have been used to
include a famous quote, and the lines are read from left to right.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

SORROW’S NESTLING (Triptych)

True sorrow word. is an understated
It rarely as a bird, flies in, nervous
but hides in traces deepest night of life’s
and breaks upon first morning light. the day’s

It needs a wing, a beak of pain a breast,

and feathers crimson foul stain. as a hell’s
No lofty eagle this prey; swoops upon
no young will morsel’s day. squabble for this

Soft sorrow lies in the nest, abandoned

or turfed out to rest by a larger bird,
upon the chance run cold of destiny
and no sweet or to be told. words to soothe

WEAVING SOUND: left, right; central GONG!

(Triptych)
I could the sweetest sounds speak with
show how abounds creative love
the words may all change the language
from they rearrange left to right
flow right to left up and down or
or modern quest in eternal
may leading heart to the middling
weave fine from each part messages
the sound until you see may pound
words float are never free but pegged
they form from pen to ink they flow
as deeper to sink meanings learn
yet simply fine-chimed sounds chisled
obliquely grow hounds grave-scenting

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CRADLED WORDS (Triptych)
I would have moment, waiting written a lifetime’s
a prettiness every day in light. of dressing
I would have sunbeams, making lifted disarming
a first-wind smile shades of night. and giggle, raised on
I would have rocked each rising breath. your sleeping; watched
Instead, I spilt your pretty death. dull earth upon

Such tiny beautiful and grave; satin coffin,

such mitten/ booties all in place; bonnet-words, sweet
empty and without a wraithe. harmless, as a sheet
Vanquished as beauty of your face, labour, in the
no words are left, are left, just dust; just earth; no words
cradled, as if breathless trust. sleeping, in simple

APRIL SHOWERS (Triptych)

Sunshine beautiful beams
rain dutiful falls
sunshine rainbows gleam beams
rain thunder palls falls
April greenly shoots
blooms unseemly dream

BEAMING (Triptych)
Venus stands girlish pink
rises flesh churlish pale
mooning reflection lunar
Neptune confection sea
scallop pay counter shell
beaming encounter smile
wide unwrapped open

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

Note: Due to the layout of this form, many editors will find it
too time-intensive to publish. Other modern poems may
display in two or three columns, which may be read as
separate verses or – sometimes – read across the three cells.

The TRIPTYCH involves precision of layout, sound and form,

and each phrase works best as a natural breath (avoiding
only conjunctions or definite article alone in a cell).
The Triptych is used in modern art, as well as traditional
religious paintings. You may wish to experiment with each
column making perfect sense, in addition to keeping sense
when all three columns are read together.
Other poets have simplified the Triptych by using a line break
before moving across to the second or third column, thus
spacing out the poem widely.

END OF TRIPTYCH POEMS

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INCUBUS / SUCCUBUS POEM, New verse form
2007 by Wendy Webb

INCUBUS/SUCCUBUS POEM (or a TRINITY; for two voices)

Note, one poem includes an Incubus (a sonnet) and a
Succubus poem merged into one using Rhythmetre (2 distinct
metres in one poem). Incubus and Succubus poems may be
displayed side by side, or one beneath another. Rhythmetre
may use named forms or free verse; blending two-into-one.

For this first example of an Incubus/Succubus poem (2007) I

have used a full rhyming sonnet, merged with a free verse
poem, using internal rhyme, which creates a Dylan Thomas
rhythm. To write effectively, both poems must read perfect
when read separately; they must also read well when read
together as one poem – both in the subject matter and the flow
of words. The rhythms of the Incubus and Succubus must be
noticeably different and probably more easily recognised when
the freer poem does not use end-line rhyme.
To create an Incubus/Succubus you may either:
Think two strands of thought on one theme, pouring evenly
like mixing drinks (and constantly reading aloud for better
choice of sound). If you choose this method, you will need to
read the Incubus and Succubus separately too, to ensure even
rhythm in the separate poetets (hence, two voices).
Create the e.g: Sonnet first (or whichever formed poem you
choose), ensure the rhyme and flow are perfect. Then begin to
think in a separate voice, with a noticeably different rhythm,
and no end-line rhyme. This second poem should
complement, line by line, the formal poem, but running at a
tangent. When this second poem is finished, it needs to be
read separately, to ensure it makes full sense as a stand-alone
poem.
In both cases, read all THREE poems (Incubus, Succubus, two
voices merged) to iron out all problems of punctuation, tense
and flow. First letter capitalisation, or bold/italicised text,
may support the differences of each poetet.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

This is not for the fainthearted and is only advisable where a

poet is experienced in traditional forms and free verse lyrical
poems.
You may prefer to present your two poems as a Diptych, side
by side, where the flow of words must work both across the
page and down each verse separately. Hence, the two poems
would have necessarily short lines. A Diptych poem would
give two perspectives, using two different rhythms.

NOTE: This was an experiment (2 poems merged into one,

but 2 distinct voices). However, due to layout difficulties and
perhaps a challenge for editors, it seems unlikely that
developing the form is worthwhile. But, it’s good to
experiment; and to follow the rules!

A WARNING (Incubus/Succubus Poem)

[Note: Quote from Poems 1891, XVI, Emily Dickinson]

Surgeons must be very careful

Though I dare not look
When they take the knife!
I stare at one bright spaceship light.
Underneath their fine incisions
See my flesh and bone
Stirs the culprit, - life!
Pulsing reflections into fright.

81
QUEST FOR TRUTH (Incubus/Succubus)

‘Still glides the stream’ and shall forever seem

Let me seek the crystal fountain where King Arthur’s chalice waits

A passing sound, unconscious of its flow,

late in harping flows of voices where deaf ears are no disgrace.

Where it will wend its way and choose to go

Chase love-pearls of scalloped beauty rising from an open shell,

Beyond our temporal world into a dream

welled to earring-set perfection paint-sourced innocence of form.

Of mountains, where the heavens soul our theme.

Let warm mountains spa and bubble, where no troubles ache soul-feet,

Where vanishings immortalise our show,

where clean Solomon bathes beauty, vanished in a love-lost souk.

Like gods who play chess on our world below,

Look to thirty silver pieces, dies cast in a soldier’s game

To check mate life’s eternity of stream.

where shade-seams unseam eternity and alabaster bleeds.

For consciousness is but a phantom scene,

Lead no harlot-scent of virgins, phantom-spiced to grail a cup

Upstaging silence pausing our tug’s tow

where stuck-earth sheds lambs to rabbits when still tomb rewrites a book.

To sunset brave as legend-breaking glow,

Look to a sunset table, round with legend and a chalice,

Where steam and soot, immortalised and clean,

Where soot-malice steams, immortalised; flows to a living stream.

Soon polish angel wings where harpies woe

Seam lost caverns’ source-pure water, angel-planed to mountain flight,

And wail the spout of steam that drownings mean.

where light-cups of steam-cloud, drowning, theme Quest’s meaning beyond night.

END OF INCUBUS POEMS

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

PALINDROMEDARY SONNET, New verse form

2007 by Wendy Webb

This new verse form (2007), devised by , uses our best-loved

form: THE SONNET. All rules of the sonnet must be followed,
and the poem must be complete, with perfect rhyme schemes,
using your preferred Shakespearian or Italian or other sonnet
form. Then a complete symmetrical mirror image is followed,
to write a palindrome from the sonnet. This involves repeating
every line of your sonnet, in reverse order, thus ending the
poem on line 28, with a complete echo of line one.

The name, Palindromedary Sonnet, has developed from

writing a complete Sonnet and then turning the poem into a
Palindrome, where every end-line rhyme repeats (or, in this
case, where every complete line is reflected). Imagine two
Dromedaries facing each other in the desert, each single-
humped camel faces the oasis, creating a perfect symmetry
from both beasts facing each other.
This form demands experience in writing traditional sonnets,
with a careful and creative use of any type of symmetry, or
mirror reflection, which would benefit from repeating perfectly
formed lines. Since every line is repeated, every line must be
perfect. If any end-line rhyme is forced, it will clang much
louder on hearing it repeated.

It is recommended that careful attention is paid to the pause at

the end of each traditional line, and enjambment is possible
but difficult, given the nature of the repeating lines.

This form will test you as much as writing a pantoum, and will
only be successful if you have carefully written the original
sonnet.
When writing the reflection (lines 15-28), particular attention
must be paid to punctuation and use of English language. Any
jerking of sound or meaning will make the poem impossible to
complete successfully. Reworking lines 1-14 may be necessary,
as you create each mirror line. In this sense, the
83
Palindromedary Sonnet is similar in approach to writing a
Pantoum, where previous lines must be reworked for sense
when repeating.

Line 1 and 14 of the sonnet must appear particularly attractive

and image-strong, since line 1 becomes the last line; and since
line 14 is repeated immediately in line 15.
It is recommended that you consider an image that bears
reflection, and that every line of the sonnet is written while
considering a slant meaning for its mirror image.
No changes of words should be used for a perfect finished
poem, but subtle variation of punctuation or meaning will
help. Two examples are included (next page).

NOTE: THIS POETRY FORM I HAVE USED EXTENSIVELY;

A FEW OTHER WRITERS HAVE TRIED, BUT IT TAKES
MUCH CONCENTRATION TO WORK EFFECTIVELY. I
HAVE ALSO TRIED THE PALINDROMEDARY FOR OTHER
FORMAL VERSE. YOU HAVE TO DECIDE WHETHER A
FORM IS TIGHT ENOUGH; OR TAKES THE REPEATING
LINES. YOU MUST ALSO TAKE PARTICULAR CARE WITH
PUNCTUATION, ADAPTING THE REPEATING LINES BY
DOUBLE ENTENDRES/SIMILAR SOUNDING WORDS, TO
ENSURE THE FLOW OF WORDS. IF THE POEM DOESN’T
FLOW, THEN DON’T TRY IT!
You may also try reading Dylan Thomas poems, who loved to
experiment with very lengthy palindromes (where the end
word of line 1 rhymes with the end word of the final line; the
rhyme gets closest together in the middle of the poem). To the
untrained eye, the poem appears not to rhyme at all; but once
you see, you can’t unsee the cleverness of the rhyme.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

BRIGHT EYES (first Palindromedary Sonnet)

A puddle-flooding map of weathered flows:

the East Coast Floods of 1953
drenched lawns and sunshine buttercups arose
where rabbits nibbled, plain to baking see.
Watership Downs of bright eyes, without fear,
as chalets blink brash curtains, flapping warm.
A breath of long ears, twitching noses, near
reflections ghosting hare-clouds in the storm.
They hop like crows, unphased by seagulls’ cries,
a shadow-spreading scrubland from a bog.
Fur coats of floating rafts where Hook’s flag flies
and time is ticking, rising on a log.
Too late to turn a tide of nature, cursed,
where Doctor’s dates and dials are breaker-burst.

Where Doctor’s dates and dials are breaker-burst

too late to turn a tide of nature, cursed;
and time is ticking, rising on a log,
fur coats of floating rafts where Hook’s flag flies
a shadow-spreading scrubland from a bog.
They hop like crows, unphased by seagulls’ cries,
reflections ghosting hare-clouds in the storm.
A breath of long ears, twitching noses, near,
as chalets blink brash curtains, flapping warm.
Watership Downs of bright eyes, without fear,
where rabbits nibbled, plain to baking see.
Drenched lawns and sunshine buttercups arose:
the East Coast Floods of 1953;
a puddle-flooding map of weathered flows.

85
BRIDGE OF SIGHS (Palindromedary Sonnet)
(Cambridge and Venice)

Stand by the Cam of light and air that bends

on pairs of praying hands new-laid in stone.
Though punting is a sight that yet depends
on love-songs, gondoliers and, when alone,

if weather-beaten sunlight trickles by

the Grand Canal’s Rialto of desire.
There where your treasure rests, no flesh may lie
in peace, except as sunset’s flaming fire

weigh-ladens mathematic loss of bridge

on sough-deep water, floating punts assured.
Venetian shades of glass, all wares that ridge
draped cloth enfolding sighs with love’s adored.

Reflecting light on water’s cambered flow,

new love’s a satin breath where shades slide slow.

New love’s a satin breath where shades slide slow,

reflecting light on water’s cambered flow.

Draped cloth enfolding sighs with love’s adored,

Venetian shades of glass. All wares that ridge
on sough-deep water, floating punts assured,
weigh-laden’s mathematic loss of bridge.

In peace, except as sunset’s flaming fire,

there where your treasure rests, no flesh may lie.
The Grand Canal’s Rialto of desire,
if weather-beaten, sunlight trickles by

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

on love-songs, gondoliers and when alone.

Though punting is a sight that yet depends
on pairs of praying hands new-laid in stone,
stand by the Cam of light and air that bends.

REFLECTING BEACH (Palindromedary Sonnet)

(for Mundesley)

A symmetry of ships on the horizon

for passing daytime passage out of sight,
where sandbanks fade to ink when out of light.
There nibs kiss sultry sky. Close denizen
of storm and surf and tide on shades of deep.
The lifeguard stands, a silhouette in reach,
stressed red / gold flags stretch pebble-straying beach,
while deckchairs / sunscreen bake parched skins asleep.

All trunks and Barbies splash in floating pool

of crabs and bladderwracks that ghost blue sky.
A flame flotilla’s paddles, seagulls by,
to mirror cerulean shades, to fool
net-bobs of fishes bubbling gills to flesh,
for air-consuming starfish in their mesh.

For air-consuming starfish in their mesh,

net-bobs of fishes bubbling gills to flesh.
To mirror cerulean shades, to fool
a flame flotilla’s paddles, seagulls by,
of crabs and bladderwracks that ghost blue sky.
All trunks and Barbies splash in floating pool,

while deckchairs / sunscreen bake parched skins asleep.

Stressed red / gold flags stretch pebble-straying beach;
the lifeguard stands, a silhouette in reach
of storm and surf and tide on shades of deep.
There nibs kiss sultry sky, close denizen
where sandbanks fade to ink when out of light.
For passing daytime passage out of sight,
a symmetry of ships on the horizon.

87
LAST TIPPLE (Palindromedary, Freestyle
sonnet)

Sensing cool and sensuous Renaissance,

I wrap my hands around this rich clear glass.
Stroke a shield of vulva, full of welcome,
to niche a thumb-print inglenook of space.
Giving in a fishbowl, full and gaping,
of rounded flesh of buttocks or of breasts.
Squeezing French kiss fist, to stretch in necking,
its smoothness shafting ice grasped in my palm.
Thrusting, pricking cork, to plunge submission
and pop, unscrewing slippy, spent, hard waste.
Tippling up its gurgling satisfaction,
poured with a fizzing splash of rash red wine.
Tasting plum, deep raspberry and cherry,
then slowing sleepiness; dreg empty glass.

Then, slowing sleepiness, dreg empty glass;

tasting plum, deep raspberry and cherry,
poured with a fizzing splash of rash red wine.
Tippling up its gurgling satisfaction
and pop, unscrewing slippy, spent, hard waste.
Thrusting, pricking cork, to plunge submission,
its smoothness shafting ice grasped in my palm.
Squeezing French kiss fist to stretch in necking,
of rounded flesh of buttocks or of breasts.
Giving in a fishbowl, full and gaping,
to niche a thumb-print inglenook of space.
Stroke a shield of vulva, full of welcome,
I wrap my hands around this rich clear glass,
sensing cool and sensuous Renaissance.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

RUBY CROWN (Palindromedary, freestyle)

I picked all rubies, ripe and sweet;

I tasted Eden’s dripping juice
beyond the sword-crossed seraphim,
where spattered mud prints brushed past sleep.

My wraps were fig leaves from the seat

of olive groves that had not learnt
to age to gnarled decay of frame.
Impressed when gardens bloomed complete,

with blood and sweat and tears, of feet

sent stumbling, grazing, knelt in prayer.
Envisioned grail’s late vanishing,
drunk to the dregs, where pain lay deep

as ocean peace on surging storm.

A crown of rubies calmed my form.

A crown of rubies calmed my form,

as ocean peace on surging storm

drunk to the dregs, where pain lay deep;

envisioned grail’s late vanishing.
Sent stumbling; grazing; knelt in prayer;
with blood and sweat and tears; of feet

impressed when gardens bloomed complete.

To age to gnarled decay of frame,
of olive groves that had not learnt
my wraps were fig leaves from the seat

where spattered mud prints brushed past sleep.

Beyond the sword-crossed seraphim,
I tasted Eden’s dripping juice;
I picked all rubies, ripe and sweet.

89
obooko.com

PERSEPHONE’S MONUMENT (Palindromedary

sonnet)

The light grows harsh, to ghost, as shades arouse

in fading monumental weathered strength,
where stretchered lifelines synchronise full length
to droll precipitations time allows.
Fingers, rippling, waver wailed tomorrows,
her failing rising, shading feasts commence
the lesser greater works of penitence,
when written leaden walls are fullest sorrows.

Now sights and sounds are wasted into past,

faced by a putty-casting loss of shape.
Watch costing recognition leached in lime?
Cosmetics peaching tide that cannot last.
Persephone’s blush rant of mirrored rape;
her dark lord quivers. Shadows intertwine.

Her dark lord quivers, shadows intertwine;

Persephone’s blush rant of mirrored rape.
Cosmetics peaching tide that cannot last;
watch costing recognition leached in lime.
Faced by a putty casting loss of shape,
now sights and sounds are wasted into past;

when written leaden walls are fullest sorrows,

the lesser greater works of penitence.
Her failing rising, shading feasts commence.
Fingers, rippling, waver wailed tomorrows
to droll precipitatations time allows,
where stretchered lifelines synchronise full length
in fading monumental weathered strength.
The light grows harsh, to ghost as shades arouse.

END OF PALINDROMEDARY SONNETS

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

PETROS ACROSTIC, New verse form 2007 by

Wendy Webb

The Acrostic poem is well-used. Usually the first letter of each

line is capitalised to spell out a word or phrase, or a name. The
acrostic letters may be emboldened to enhance the intended
message. Acrostics may sometimes be used randomly through
a poem, when emboldened letters will spell out a particular
message.

To write the Petros Acrostic (2007), variation devised by , the

acrostic message is spelt through the middle of the poem, the
‘bedrock’. Hence the name, Peter means ‘rock’. In order to
write a successful poem, the length of sentence may be quite
flexible. A new sentence is begun in the middle of each line, to
ensure capitalisation of the acrostic letter in each line. The
flexible sentence length ensures a meaningful, rather than
forced, message in the poem.

There is no word or syllable count, and no particular metrical

feet need be used. Variation of word lengths, and sentence
lengths is recommended. Sentences should flow, as with
natural speech, although the abrupt mid-line full stop may
affect the type of poem you can produce. Double entendres,
puns and other poetic devices work well with this form.
Enjambment or rhythmic pauses at the end of each line should
be handled with particular care.

NOTE: The Acrostic letters are spelled through the bedrock of

the poem (the middle); where each sentence must begin. Use
flexible line and word lengths.
Many acrostic poems circulate; some start of line/a few, end
of line. This uses the middle of line/BOLD makes it visible.

91
PETROS ACROSTIC – Happy New Year

So let us live. Hope for better

than the past. Arrive at year’s end
with satisfaction. Proof of sated dreams
glowing warm. Pleased our potential
sings a laurel crown. Yellow with trumpet spring.

We have arrived. Newly challenged

to silent footprints. Even fall,
a crisp page. Wet with ink.

Let’s live. York walls

to raise our sights. Energetic peals
of drifting sound. Angelic choirs
ring bowspring sky. Rending heaven.

PETROS ACROSTIC – Paris

Not for the faint-hearted. Placing a scaffold

where Mona Lisa smiles. Annunciating Egypt
to a puzzled sphinx. Reflecting tourists
intent on capturing a bosom. Inhaling grail-light
on the Seine. Sacred as a heart of stone.

PETROS ACROSTIC – London

A wren appeals. Lays a hero to rest,

rocked on the Thames. Opening blind eyes
on British flight. Nelson’s Column
raising standards. Drawing people and palace
to Art. Opening perspectives
on storm clouds. Noon strikes, cowboys spin.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

EASTER SONNET (Acrostic)

He hems the garden garment’s golden bloom,

Arriving as late frost prowls lent to die
Perpetually, in morning’s sunrise sky:
Proud as a cruciform that spreads its gloom.
Young chicks are sanitised, to dress each room,

Enfolding foil and chocolates nearby:

Apparent Russian dolls will shroud and lie;
Sweet broken egg cups foiled to bleach a tomb.
Taste death’s shaved mane, in sensual depth and dark,
Eradicating wrappings bled to night;
Recycled in white tales and melting pause.

Dream skies of dancing feathers into lark,

Arising stone in pause of death to light.
Yawning at day’s start when heaven roars.

DEPRESSED (Acrostic)

Do not disturb my sleep, for it’s a tiger, still

enraged by rampant seas of my despair.
Protect my mind with soothing verse, not planned
reactions from the great, the good, the famous.
Engaging they may be, when calm to chord
such music that a happy person plays.
Sense my despair and pause before you speak:
empty with your flesh poured to my glass.
Despair and smash my wine; or drink its depth.

END OF ACROSTIC POEMS

93
STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS POETRY 2008, as
used by Wendy Webb

How to write in a ‘stream of consciousness’: WELL! Begin

with a special focus ('gold' in my case); pour in at least 2 years’
of intense tragedy and stress; fill up with all modern and trad.
GOOD poets, so that the words are whizzing around 'down in
the cellar'; open up your early years to intense scrutiny
('Prelude'); THEN next time you have a devastating episode,
instead of retiring with the vapours or going on a long jog
/gym session/ bottle of wine... observe EVERY emotion and
look at your body 'under the microscope' as it's still happening,
considering what words best describe your head, gut, etc at
this precise moment...
After that, you are ready to try 'stream of consciousness'
approach... this means writing in blank verse, free verse,
internal rhyming verse and incubus/succubus all at the same
time, without any thought whatsoever. Your entire attention
should be on that 'wisp' of The Muse - for which you have
dropped everything instantly and grabbed pen and paper...
then keep on writing with the flow until you have finished, or
exhaustion takes over! If you have a few unusual thoughts
along the way - include them, don't leave them out.
To give the poem unity, you need to use the ballad technique,
of repeating lines and phrases; and a technique of 'dropping
hints like mallets' (symbols, leitmotifs) - these show that what
you wrote was intentional and not a haphazard sprinkling of
random thoughts!
To ensure accuracy, always make sure your poetic 'voice' is
loud and clear with a subject that you know very well (or a
well-known composer, artist, musician, place, trivia)...
and then type up the poem checking with a toothcomb for
spellings, punctuation, Encarta, Thesaurus and overuse of
rhyme (your musing voice).
Er, that's about it - it's like switching from Byzantine art to
Impressionism...
Or from Picasso to Salvador Dali...

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

Be warned - it leaves a HUGE headache afterwards - but you

will be 'high' for days! It's very exciting and liberating... give it
a whirl.
(Ecclesiastes): Oh, and that was TWO long poems - because I
went on days later to 'Revelations' - and that was a dream - my
Kubla Khan poem. Now that is VERY different - all story, and
no visible exoskeleton.

READ WENDY’S ‘stream of consciousness’

poetry:-
LAMENTATIONS, Dec 2007
ECCLESIASTES (with Revelations)
REVELATIONS
TRANSMIGRATION, 2007

95
SLIDING DOORS, New poetry form 2009 by
Wendy Webb

Not for the faint-hearted. Use the SLIDING DOORS (parallel

universe) technique, to a) send a well-crafted formal poem into
uncharted territory (at the very least, it will make you consider
your words in a new way; you may then write a different poem
entirely! To crack writers’ block… or b) following extensive
revision, punctuation and alteration of sentences and words,
you may find a shiny new poem, by recycling old materials!
You will notice I have simply SLID the last (rhyming word) to
the start of the sentence. That’s it. This technique will only
work on a finished and well-crafted formal poem e.g: sonnet,
pantoum. It does not have to be a form that demands
repeating lines (like the pantoum). It can work extremely well
with sonnets; and for those of you finding difficulty in breaking
your ‘usual’ straitjacket… this can help you to Salvador Dali
(without the brain-drain of weaving many strands to make a
rope—thanks Richard Bradshaw, for that image - or noose!)

Obviously SLIDING DOORS will change the rhythm, iambic

pentameter, and, particularly, the meaning of your poem. As
poet, it is your job to ensure the finished poem has its own
unity and meaning.

Poets who have tried this technique? None, that I am aware

of! Apart from: the self!

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

NOTE: In my limited experience, this technique will not work

on a poorly-crafted poem; it also doesn’t work well with an
uneven pattern of free verse; blank verse: maybe?

[Footnote 2013: In practice, I think this is a useful starting

point for creating a new poem, since it helps with thinking
about words and meanings in a new way. WW]

NOTE (2023): I think the best use for this technique is

providing a way of looking fresh at some of your old poems.
When you see the movement of words and lines, you gain new
understanding of subjects you may not have considered
before. Let it be a starting point. After that: edit, edit, edit!
And let it sit and stew for a few weeks, then look at your
‘finished’ poem again. You may then see the glaring errors.
Distance for fresh perspective!

97
OASIS NEAR (Sliding Doors style)

Oasis there, a myrrful near

sand, where the stones are clear as
water. Spreading mile on mile like
land, in that far off. Distant

camels. No wise men train like

breath, where the dung is sweet as
Bethlehem. And the holy place at
death stars, where rockets raze to

incense. There’s a shallow Jordan’s

feet. Cool to gently bathe scuffed
Herod, near the doming power of
complete: where my soul brooks. Clods

sorrow from an ark of golden

peace, where the earth bucks knees of
infancy. There, a heaven’s perfect
release straws aureoles.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

PLAYING CAT AND MOUSE (Sliding Doors style

pantoum)

Well, the marvel is you remember so,

Eden Venus nude and beckoning from
hell. Bathing in heaven but feeding in
golden, weather-beaten nymphs of springtime.

Eden Venus nude and beckoning from

pink, flush marble. Chill to ghost, no pert and
golden, weather-beaten nymphs of springtime.
Drink fey daisies and petals, stooping to

pink, flush marble chill. To ghost no pert and

shoulder chaffinch playmates, perching on her.
Drink fey daisies and petals, stooping to
bolder breeding blackbirds, cocked heads, darting.

Shoulder chaffinch playmates, perching on her

snow. Espy in a flurry of sunset,
bolder breeding blackbirds’ cocked heads’ darting
flow. Prey-scared to wraithe pure warning sound and

snow. Espy in a flurry of sunset

sky. Weigh Grasmere’s breathless reflection of
flow. Prey-scared to wraithe pure warning sound and,
by-step whiskered waterfall to Rydal’s

skyway. Grasmere’s breathless reflection of

lawn lays like a garden cat, warm on the
by-step whiskered waterfall to Rydal’s
dawn. Lane-dead mouse lies in moonlight fresh as

lawn. Lays like a garden cat, warm on the

hell’s-bathing in heaven, but feeding in
dawn. Lane-dead mouse lies in moonlight; fresh as
well. The marvel is you remember so.

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SHAGGED OUT (Sliding Doors style pantoum)

Shore I stand, a shag upon the

dry, watch-grey tide. Wash my sand-steps
before my arms, a crucifix.
Fly shade’s darkest shadows. Learn to

dry-watch grey tide. Wash my sand-steps:

hills to slate-sky arrows from the
fly. Shade’s darkest shadows learn to
sills. Bow-weary miles where bats ledge

hills. To slate sky arrows from the

wave-drip. Caves are leaden, like shot
sills. Bow-weary miles, where bats ledge
pave. To ebb strength, flapping crazy-

wave. Drip-caves are leaden like shot

sea-surf. Stranded on a land of
pave, to ebb strength-flapping crazy
eternity. Stretched darkness, blank

sea. Surf-stranded on a land of

before. My arms a crucifix.
Eternity-stretched darkness, blank
shore. I stand, a shag upon the…

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

RESTING IN PEARLS (Sliding Doors style

pantoum)

Rest. And here they brought her noble bones to

good. To lay unrusted yet worn out by
blessed, full 99. Her planted years now
flood. Slope their slow passage to the fallen.

Good to lay unrusted, yet worn out by

feet. Her white hair lies in drifts around her
flood. Slope their slow passage to the fallen
meat. The stream and bridge meander where we

feet. Her white hair lies in drifts around my

bloom, to rake the winter parchment into
meat. The stream and bridge meander where we
tomb, to hail immaculate within a

bloom. To make the winter parchment into

dell, I stoop beneath a bridge and reach a
tomb. To hail immaculate within a
hell, I seek the girl’s pearl earring-barring

dell. I stoop beneath a bridge and reach a…

understood, those pearls that were her eyes. There,
hell. I seek the girl’s pearl earring, barring
wood. Pearl earrings, necklace strings: a snowdrop

understood. Those pearls that were her eyes, there

blessed. Full 99 her planted years. Now,
would pearl earrings, necklace strings, a snowdrop
rest? And here they brought her noble bones, too.

END OF SLIDING DOORS POEMS

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BRENTOR SONNET, New poetry form 2009 by
Wendy Webb

The Brentor Sonnet uses basic iambic pentameter, but divides

equally between 2 verses of 7 lines each. The rhyme scheme is:
ababcxc dedefxf, where x may be unrhymed or rhyme or slant
rhyme to form a final rhyming couplet in each verse. It should
be noted that lines 6/7 and 13/14 are split for visual and sound
effect, wherever suitable, to form two halves of five iambic feet
(pentameter), although variations in footwork are allowed,
particularly in these resonant lines.

Flexibility of phrasing is intentional; sound and visual effect is

more important than metrical precision; however, careful use
of end-line rhyme (and internal sound echoes) is essential to
this form.

THE BRENTOR SONNET

I saw that seat of Paradise: a hill,

transfigured in the mist, was just a shade
of light and dark where all of earth lay still
as, transient with sweet, has infant-made,
that thrilled the climb round narrow winding road
to ‘Touch Me Not’
where souls and sky behold:

Embrangled mist which weaves earth into wings.

There in a chapel, there where pilgrims pray,
the closeness of sleep heaven whips and stings;
betraying, with a kiss, this love-bright day
where whistling wind leaves breathless life as poor
as knocking on Brentor
on heaven’s door.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

SPANISH STEPS (Brentor sonnet)

Moored in that harbour, where all earth’s a stage

for proferred roses, or a photograph.
Rest at Bernini’s fountainhead, then rage
and rage again, in water’s troubled past,
to nightingale the midnight hour, adored.
Like water pouring, moored
like water pooling, stored.
Apollo floods my hours, writ in water,
astern where crowds flow down the Spanish steps.
My powers flow where vendors tout wares shorter:
this vessel sinks to flood in Neptune’s depths
and bow, as flesh slides deeper; to awake.
Ragged tourists take
and ragged tourists break.

NOTE: MANY EXPERIMENTS HAVE BEEN TRIED WITH

THE SONNET, MOSTLY BY CHANGING THE RHYMING
SCHEME END-OF-LINE. INDEED, ONE MAGAZINE
ACCEPTS MANY VARIETIES OF 14-LINE POEMS AND
CALLS THEM SONNETS (WITH NO RHYME SCHEME).
HOPEFULLY, NO-ONE WILL CHOOSE A POEM OF
VARIABLE LENGTH A ‘SONNET’, BUT YOU NEVER
KNOW! TRADITIONALLY, IAMBIC PENTAMETER IS
USED, ALTHOUGH OTHER FORMS MAKE FULL USE OF
TETRAMETER AND MANY OTHER LINE-LENGTHS. IF
YOU MENTION TROCHAIC FEET, I’M OFF!

END OF BRENTOR SONNETS

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SYNAESTHESIA, Approach to Poetry 2010 by

The limitations of Stream of Consciousness poetry (and more

importantly, the limitation of critics in understanding the form
used) led to an alternative phraseology to describe Wendy’s
approach to poetry (or, poetic voice developed from extensive
literary reading across the centuries)… not that it took WW
centuries to read her sources!

An experience in the dentist’s chair, comparable to a

synaesthetic experience, led to this redefinition of her latest
work. Synaesthesia is the ability (or disability?) to ‘see’
colours, ‘hear’ tastes, in fact, an altered brain state. Since this
produces some great artistic work, and new movements in
understanding of form, perspective, rules, it is a useful
technique for the poet.

Writing in Stream of Consciousness, it is perceived that the

poet is not using their own creative abilities to shape the poem
and follow the rules of a particular poem (whether following a
form or free verse).

Writing using Synaesthesia is a way of describing the process

by which a poem is created. All the skills of the poet are fully
utilised to create the current work, using whatever form or
rules apply (in the poet’s judgement) to the poem created.

The Salvador Dali technique was compared to pouring

(simultaneously) a jug of coffee and a jug of milk, both into the
cup to produce the finished drink.

To write as a Synaesthetic experience involves the spark of

creativity throughout the process of forming the poem, using
every technique available to the poet. It is like juggling an
entire forest in order to paint one bluebell…
The voice of the poet emerges as the poem is created; and the
poet keeps in mind every image/sense/form/rhythm/meaning
as the poem emerges.
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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

The poem is fully edited on completion, simply to ensure

punctuation/spelling/rhythm are maintained as intended.

The MERMAID TALES are written by Synaesthesia – they also

happen to be based loosely on iambic pentameter, with lulls
and storms. Each tale contains both the ‘cellar’ experience of
the subconscious, and full conscious control of the poem as it
forms (like painting a fresco).

It takes considerable brain power to complete a poem in this

way, and leaves the mind exhausted. However, it also creates
surprising trains of thought and intention in the finished
poem. If you were looking for a poetry form with an easy
checklist of rules to follow – there isn’t one! But every
Synaesthetic poem follows its own set of rules and can only be
judged from within the experience. The Mermaid Tales taste
blue, and scent of light and dark; they look salty and smart
from Avalon to Fibonacci.

[Postscript 2013: poets use this technique all the time; it’s
called ‘poetry’! WW]

NOTE (2023): Synaesthesia is a fascinating way of

experiencing the world; poets everywhere need to find new
ways of expressing themselves; changing the way the reader
views the world, or shares a new emotion. At the end of the
day, poetry takes a lifetime and poets will learn from what
they read and what they experience. Make it fun, and dazzle
us!

105
STAR DAVIDIAN – new variation of form (2012)
Wendy Webb

The Davidian (2002), Wendy’s first devised poetry form, was

launched in the year of Golden Jubilee. To mark the Diamond
Jubilee of the Queen, and more importantly to mark the
passing of her firstborn son to the stars, Wendy has devised a
2012 variation of form.

It is suitable for memorial poems, seasonal poems (using the

acrostic STAR in every verse), and for celebratory poems.
Every verse must use 10 syllables in each of 4 lines (or, if you
prefer, iambic pentameter). The verses may be rhymed or
unrhymed, since the Davidian was devised with a) a love of
traditional forms, and b) the flexibility of modern forms.

Every verse also has a PERFECT short line of 7 syllables; this

line may be a repeating, or progressive line; or a quote. It is
crucial that this line carries most weight, meaning, and
balance.

To write the STAR DAVIDIAN (2012), from one verse to a

legendary sequence of verses, the only addition is the word
STAR, spelt in acrostic at the start of the four lines. In
memory of DAVE, who’s now a star, the first-ever creation of
this form uses STARS, spelt across all five lines (see example).

It is appropriate in this Diamond Jubilee year, a perfect STAR

has been devised, in memory of the poet’s own son. There is
also a website through Just Giving, to raise funds for the
National Autistic Society in memory of DAVE and, one day, to
have a star named after him.

NOTE: It’s acrostic, it’s easy, it’s great as a winter seasonal

poem and we love stars. Give it a try! I return to this form.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

THAT FIRST CHRISTMAS STAR (Star Davidian

2012 – 1st recorded poem)
In memory of DAVE, our first Christmas star.

Sometimes I wake to play that old, old game,

tell consciousness to, restless, think less deep;
arriving somewhere far away, by name.
Remembering his face in peaceful sleep.
Smiling at the memory.

So take me there tonight, where dream pretends

that he could wake alive – as if it’s true –
around that second corner magic sends.
Remaining like as heaven when time’s through.
Smiling at the memory.

Still care for me: this canopy of safety,

taut parachute in vivid shades of red
and I will billow/fall when whipped winds, hasty,
realign like grief that wakes the dead.
Smiling at the memory.

So tell me, dust and ashes, when? Oh, when!

Trace lonely shooting stars that flare and sail.
Annunciate the flesh of Godhead, then
rain Gabriel in moonlight, where clouds fail.
Smiling at the memory.

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STAR SHINE (2013) – new verse form devised by
Wendy Webb

This newly devised poetry form uses both concrete poetry (it is
a centred star, though flexibility in shape is allowed), and
acrostic. There is also a central word (middle of line 10) of
SHINE. The acrostic letters appear at the start of every line, to
spell out:
NOWDAVIDWEBBISASTAR. The form must be 19 lines long.
No other acrostic words are allowed as Star Shine. Should
alternative acrostic words be used, then Star Shine must
include the variation in brackets i.e: STAR SHINE (acrostic
variation).

There are no form rules about the theme; nor about the
emotion or subject matter; these are entirely open for the
poet’s exploration. However, it ceases to be a Star Shine form
if there are more or less than 19 lines. Star Shine must always
include a) star shape centred, and b) SHINE is the central
word (in caps). There is no need to capitalise the acrostic
letters. There is no rule about iambics, nor about number of
words or syllables; this star can flex!
Note: creative individuals may use more than one star in a
poem! But every verse must follow the same rules.

Star Shine (2013) was inspired by the life and death of the
poet’s eldest son, to whom this form is a tribute. There is also
a website through Just Giving, to raise funds for autism.
DAVE died in late 2012, and was just nineteen years old.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

GENESIS OF STAR SHINE

First recorded example of Star Shine (2013)

No
open
window
draws shades
at stilling news’
violent simplicity,
in knowing lately of a son’s
dreadfully darkened room
where life exhaled. Is dead. Is gone.
Evoke a scene’s SHINE, to shoot a star
back to that first Big Bang.
Black Hole is all that’s left
in this heart and home.
So sleep silently
as air, rising:
softly, storm:
tearing an
aura of
rain.

NOTE: This is a lovely form to try, especially for Christmas

and other Winter festivals. It’s an acrostic, with a concrete
shape (centred is simplest); and it carries a simple message…
with as much skill as you can use to write a poem with
meaning, consonance, assonance, echoe sounds or
alliteration. Give it a try, every year. Put it on a greetings
card.

109
VARIATION (editors will hate this one, but nice
on a card!):

No
open
window
draws shades
at stilling news’
violent simplicity,
in knowing lately of a son’s
dreadfully darkened room
where life exhaled. Is dead. Is gone.
Evoke a scene’s SHINE, to shoot a star
back to that first Big Bang.
Black Hole is all that’s left
in this heart and home.
So sleep silently
as air, rising:
softly, storm:
tearing an
aura of
ra in.

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WENDY WEBB’S NEW POETRY FORMS /2023

ANOTHER VARIATION:

No
Open
Window
Draws shades
At stilling news’
Violent simplicity,
In knowing lately of a son’s
Dreadfully darkened room
Where life exhaled. Is dead. Is gone.
Evoke a scene’s SHINE, to shoot a star
Back to that first Big Bang.
Black Hole is all that’s left
In this heart and home.
So sleep silently
As air, rising:
Softly, storm:
Tearing an
Aura of
Rain.

THE END

111